In my opinion the bed bugs are the
most difficult indoor pest to get rid of.
Hands down, and it's because
you pretty much need to get 100%
control of bed bugs.
If you kill 99.9% of bed bugs, and you
leave one fertilized female, you're going
to have another infestation in a couple
of months.
That's why they're so difficult.
And they're small, they're flat, they
can hide pretty much anywhere.
As we'll find out they are resistant
to most of the insecticides that
we're going to use today.
So, getting started on identification.
I actually have a preserved bed bug
here from the hotel that I stayed at.
I actually do have bed bugs here.
Actually here's one vile with a bunch
of bed bugs, they just got yesterday
from a hotel in Nevada. They are kind of
elongated, which means they recently
fed. So you'll see they are full of blood.
There are a couple of different life
stages in here.
There's one vile with two bugs in it.
These are actually, I believe these
are the swallow bugs.
This is a non-target submissive.
And then another vile with one
adult dead bug.
You'll get to check those out.
I've been trying to get a hold of
a live colony, maybe I'll have some for
you next year. We can pass them around
and let them feed.
[Laughter]
[Woman] You want them to feed so you can
build up the allergy reaction so that
you'll know as soon as you get them.
[Presenter] Haha, right, yeah.
If you keep being fed on time and time
again, you will develop an allergy.
[Man] Right, when we do that one
we'll have it in a different district.
[presenter] Ok, haha
[Woman 2] We'll do it in the summer
we'll do it in the park.
[Presenter] Well I was thinking,
if you know if you had a vile with
a couple bed bugs in it, you could feed
them once and then put them in the fridge
at like 30-40 degrees they won't need to
feed again for months on end.
You wouldn't have to feed them that often.
Unless you want to, I don't know.
Anyway, so, are bed bugs visible to the
naked eye?
Yes, you can see them, you can see
every part of their life cycle.
Starting with eggs, which are about
a milometer long, you can see they're
creamy white.
There's a little hole in the top like that
that means they've already hatched.
When they first come out, this is called
a first in star or first stage nymph.
So this is the immature stage.
Before they feed they are actually
really clear.
So they can be pretty hard to see before
they've fed, they are almost invisible
against a white background.
But, once they've fed you see these little
red dots running around.
Then they are pretty easy to see.
And they grow, they get bigger and bigger.
The full grown adult is about 6 milometers
in length. So you'll see that in the
vial, so definitely visible.
Again, I mentioned they were kind
of flattened, which allows them to fit
into cracks and crevices.
So that helps them hide.
Identification, somebody had asked about
the wings.
Well if you find something with wings,
it's not a bed bug.
Bed bugs never have wings.
That's one way to separate bed bugs out.
Unfortunately, the hemipterans,
which is a whole order of insects,
as immatures they don't have wings.
They all kind of look like this.
What they do have are these little
pads right there, they call them wing pads
That's something we commonly see
on immature hemipterans.
As insects grow, you know these wing
pads will get a little bigger, a little
bigger, a little bigger, and eventually
they form wings.
But in bed bugs that doesn't happen.
They never have wings.
Easy to remember, for people who
aren't anthromologists, these are
some things that I think are pretty close
non-targets visually.
You know we have young cockroaches here,
those look a lot like bed bugs, I think.
Then here's one of those hemipterans,
this is immature you can see those
elongated wing pads right here.
You can see the wings are growing on
this guy. When it reaches adult hood
it'll have full wings.
That's a stink bug, right, we've all
seen those. You know what they look
like as adults.
Now this one here is called a masked
hunter, again that's another hemipteran.
Anybody recognize this guy.
[inaudible]
Alright, yeah, it's a carpet beetle
larvae.
They do kind of resemble, bed bugs,
especially their exuviae, or the skin
that they shed.
I think that looks a lot like bed bugs
shed skin.
[Inaudible]
Yeah, they're different if you know what
you're talking about.
But if you don't know what you're talking
about they look pretty similar.
To make things more complicated, as
we have a few non-targets, and all of
these I've received in the past year.
Here's what a bed bug looks like,
we have bat bugs, poultry bugs, and
swallow bugs.
Actually, I think those other ones I'm
passing around are poultry bugs not
swallow bugs.
So, in the lab I look at them under
the microscope and bed bugs have a
certain pattern of hairs right here that
is different from the bat bug pattern
of hairs. The other ones I think
just by looking at them you can tell
they don't look like bed bugs, if you're
an antomologist.
So, getting to that question, can these
bugs feed on humans. Yes, they can
feed on humans, but they can't reproduce
using a human host.
So, if you get any of these get rid of
the bats, get rid of the poultry,
or get rid of the swallows or birds,
and your problem will eventually just
go away.
These things might come and feed on
you for a while, in the absence of their
host, but they won't be laying eggs.
Their population is not going to build.
Up until this year, especially in cabins
and homes in Park City and things,
I get a lot of bat bugs.
Like half and half.
You know I don't think what I get at the
lab is an accurate sampling, of what's
actually going on.
This is the most common non-target
that I get, are the bat bugs.
[Inaudible]
I'm sorry, the size are almost identical
in size.
I mean, if I get something that people
think is a bed bug I definitely take it
to the scope and I look for these hair
patterns right here.
Immediately, I can say that's a bat bug
or it's not.
These ones here you can pretty much tell
they are not bed bugs, but just to be
thorough I run them through
my identification keys.
So I can say, maybe you have a bird
problem or maybe chickens are a problem.
Like move the chickens away from the house
Right there is your IPM control strategy.
[Woman] How far should the coup be?
[Presenter] I would say, they don't want
to leave their primary host.
If you have the pen adjacent to the house,
then they might come in and feed on
you accidentally. But if you have the pen
right next to the house and you get rid
of your chickens then they'll probably
migrate into the house to feed on you.
So be careful, when you take away the host
they go looking for new hosts.
I would say if this thing is across
the yard, they're probably not going
to make that journey through the grass,
and they can't fly so.
Primarily, keep things away from the house
there are insecticides you can use on the
chickens if you want to treat those things
but I don't know if that's worth it.