AAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!! :eek:
Shit.
I would have pitted the damned things but I doubt that they read the Dope.
It’s like a horror show. I’ve got itchy welts from the damned things, and when I wake up I see them running in all directions. If you crush them it’s a bloody mess. Like vampire insects. :eek:
Any idea how you are going to tackle them?
Everything I read says to call a professional. In my case that means I call the landlord and he calls a professional.
The downstairs apartment will have to be treated also or it’s a waste of time, from what I understand.
A good place to start is to put anything from the bed you can in the dryer. Use a meat thermometer at the end of an hour to check that the center of the load is 130F. That temperature at 15 minutes will kill them for sure. Order bed bug certified mattress cases and cover all mattresses with them. You still need an exterminator, but you will greatly reduce the population if you cover mattresses and use dryer heat for everything you can fit in there.
Hope you get rid of them soon.
Had them in a beach bungalow in the tropics. Told the proprietor who promptly dragged the mattresses out into the hot bakey sun for a full day. Problem solved.
It’s summer, give it a try, you’ve got nothing to lose except bed bugs!
I’d disinfect the bedstead and vacuum the room after, just to be sure. Be sure to remove the vacuum bag immediately after, from your house! Wash all the linens, on the long cycle in hot water.
That’s how many professionals do it, with steam. The buggers like dark and cool, not bright and hot.
Good luck, be sure to let us know what you finally decide and how it works out, it seems a problem many, many people are suffering with, and I’m sure they’d love to know.
Actually, I’ve been sleeping on the living room sofa recently because the window air conditioner in the bedroom isn’t working, so hopefully it’s just the sofa that’s infested. It’s old and worn in spots and really should be replaced anyway so maybe that’s my answer, although I’d hate to bring in a new one and have it get infested.
I don’t want to go back to sleeping in the bedroom because: a: it’s too hot, and b: I don’t want them to follow their food source into the bedroom and infest the bed, along with my drawers and closets of clothing.
I have caught a couple in the bathroom. Hopefully they were on me when I walked in there, otherwise they’ve taken up residence in more than just the sofa.
Sorry man… I had them two years ago and they eventually followed me from the bed to the couch. You can’t keep them in a certain area. Might as well try the steam and dryer and getting new mattresses with bed bug proof covers. The couch/sofa is done for.
Also check your clothes…
The bed is due to be replaced also, so maybe my answer is to toss the bed and sofa. I have large area rugs in the living room and bedroom, I probably should toss those also.
My fear is that I’ll refurnish the place and still have these damned vampire bugs.
Maybe I have to sleep in body armor and starve them. 
I really feel for you here… Good luck. I dread the day I have to deal with this because I would totally not deal with it well.
Winky face aside, the Wikipedia article on bedbugs cites that they can live for a year without feeding. :eek: :eek:
And don’t think too long about enlisting any help from natural predators, either: they’re chiefly cockroaches, ants and spiders. :eek: 
:eek:
I’m giving myself the willies just reading all this. Honestly I’d be at serious risk of setting fire to most of my house.
Spiders don’t sound like a bad idea, actually. If I thought I could buy some species of spider, release it on my apartment, and eliminate the bedbugs, I might seriously consider it.
If the infestation is localiazed, that should work. I’ve not seen any sign of bedbugs since January, after replacing my bed and a futon mattress. I’m pretty sure the ones I had seen prior to that were scouting parties from another unit trying to set up colonies here but I’d always catch them before any single colony grew to more than a dozen.
What is up with the bedbugs lately? I feel like I’m reading something from Medieval times.
There’s a definite resurgence in the US in recent years. Authorities aren’t sure of the reason.
I bet they feed on anti-bacterial soaps :0
They feed ONLY on blood, but antibacterial soaps are bad for other reasons.
I’ve made arrangements to sleep with relatives until the problem is rectified. I seem to have a seriously nasty reaction to the bites. I simply can’t sleep there for now. I can’t put up with the welts, plus it’s psychologically very difficult on me. I’m literally jumping at shadows. I can’t get any decent sleep.
I just have to be VERY careful not to bring them with me.
Unless you take them over to your relatives place. They travel very easily. On the plus side, though they make cause you to freak out, they do not carry any diseases.
This is why you won’t see any effort to get rid of them. If they carried diseases you’d have massive efforts or a return of DDT or something similar.
It’s the Taliban.
Here’s an old post of mine describing how I got rid of my infestation pretty easily. If you’re without carpeting or pets and your infestation is still heavily localized, I’d say there’s a good chance you can follow my roadmap to victory without calling in a professional. Either way, though, get yourself some diatomaceous earth, ASAP. Seriously, it’s your first line of defense, and given enough time (i.e. months) it will solve the problem. We spread it all around the baseboards of the whole apartment, around the beds, and we also used it to quarantine each room from the rest of the house. Essentially, any bugs who came looking for a meal doomed themselves … and eventually they all get hungry, you know?
Also, it’s not a given that they’re going to spread to adjacent apartments (though it’s certainly possible).
ETA: The couch may well have to go, however. If you dump it on the curb, make sure to leave a sign.
My upstairs neighbor had them.
So far, I have not seen any in my place. Is this just wishful think that I may escape infestation?