How to Avoid Bedbugs

BEDBUGS.

<Insert dramatic music here>

An adult bedbug, and a baby bedbug.

Yep, the dreaded bedbugs. The one nightmare both men and women face. Either you're terrified of the creatures themselves, or the damage and the nests they can build. Imagine sleeping in your bed, and once you fall asleep, thousands of the buggers crawl out the bed and suck on your blood leaving nothing but unpleasant red marks all over your thighs, arms, belly.

How can we avoid such rude and unappreciative guest? Well first, we need to identify what they look like. Don't start burning your house down after you think you saw a bedbug, it might have been Uncle Rick or Aunt Martha.

WARNING: After editing this post, and taking another look at the horrifying pictures I selected, I strongly suggest not finishing this article, I mean some of the pictures I found, were so horrible, and gave me such large goosebumps, that I myself will be unable to sleep comfortably tonight. If you think the picture below is a "little" terrifying, which isn't, you'll be horrified to the point in which you cannot describe your emotions without mentioning "horrifying" multiple times. Turn back while your eyes have yet to be scarred.

They don't even contribute to the rent!

• Bed buys usually have a flat oval body about a quarter of a inch wide, and a small head attached to it, all of them have six legs mainly in the front. They can be reddish brown, but can be white, brown, orange, and even light tan. When the parasite freshly consumed blood, it would look larger and darker. Newly hatched bedbugs are yellowish in color and are the size of a pinhead. It's a diverse population!

• Speaking of diverse, bedbugs don't just stick close to beds. They can be in chairs, couches, TVs, and even computers! Although they are commonly found in beds, not every bug you find remotely near what I described earlier, is a bedbug. Don't set fire to your beds and couches before you confirm it's a bedbug, and not just a common creepy crawly.

So how do these blood sucking beast get into our homes?

• Usually, they're brought home by luggage, clothing or electronics. They don't appear out of nowhere though, obviously you need to come into contact to a infested location in order to bring some home.

• Bedbugs can be found more commonly in places where people have been sleeping, such as hotels, motels, and even college dorms. Due to their flat bodies, they can sneak into cracks easily, they can hide/travel in small vents in your home, or even MP3 players. Bedbugs love warm places, they enjoy to hide in places such as computers due to this, they may hide in laptops, netbooks, DSL ports, and even battery jacks.

• You can avoid sitting down in public benches since they are often sat on by various "colorful" people, and many of them are made out of wood. In fact, avoid sitting down in general. Don't even look at the benches. Shame on you for doubting me, I can't even look at you anymore.

You looked at it didn't you?! Didn't you!

Now, we all need to sleep in hotel's eventually, how would we detect them? Here's how.

• When you're about to sleep in a bed check the seams of the bed, examine mattresses, inspect the headboard. 

• Examine all wood furniture, bedbugs tend to like lodging in comfy wood houses to oppose to metal and plastic houses. They've got style, you gotta admit.

Wait, what about my home? Screw your home; Just kidding. Here's how to detect them if their inside of your home.

• They are very good at hiding. They can hide behind your wallpaper, your TV, your light switches, under rugs, under carpets, phones, backpacks etc.

• Suspect the possibility of bedbugs if anyone in your household complains of strange bites during the night. (Unless you begin to notice increased sensitivity to sunlight, sharper and longer teeth, and blood thirst.)

• Examine your bed's creases for fecal matter, those bedbugs gotta poop eventually, and they don't have the luxury of a fancy toilet at their disposal. The poop is usually very small, but visible to the naked eye, it should appear black to dark brown to reddish.

If you see this, you may have bedbugs.

•  Look for tiny blood stains if you've crushed a few during your sleep, and look for brown molted skin that bedbugs shed when they reach adulthood.

I FOUND THIS PICTURE AND IT WAS SO HORRIBLE THAT I HAD TO POST IT. I MEAN, LOOK AT IT. IT'S SO HORRIBLY HORRIFYING, I CANNOT DISABLE CAPS LOCK.

• Again, examine wood furniture, look for small cracks and holes; bedbugs can surprise you on how small of a hole they can get through.

• Examine cracks and holes in walls. They may travel in pipes and drywall from your next door neighbor. Don't march over to your neighbor and set them on fire if you find a few bedbugs though, it probably isn't their fault.

This is what it looks like at night. You know what? Maybe you should set your neighbor on fire.

• If you find red, itchy bumps in a row or grouped together you may have bedbugs. More then one "grouping" may mean 'a heck lot of bedbugs'.

Ouchie.

• A strong sweet odor may be found near a very large infestation. The bedbugs secrete oils that smell pleasant, so there's a trade-off if you wish to keep them.

• The adult bedbugs, or what we call "the big boys", can survive for years without drinking blood, so just because that old apartment that nobody has lived in for seven years doesn't mean there aren't any pest waiting to feed off your unconscious body.

"it cool, i be wait for blood suck though."

How do we get rid of them? Contact a reputable bug professional, it'll cost some money, but it's better then buying back thousands of dollars of furniture.

OR,