Regular vacuuming is a good first step to controlling bed bugs. Make sure to double bag the vacuum cleaner and dispose of it in an outdoor trash container.

Check your mattress piping and other furniture crevices regularly for live bugs, fecal spots, and molted nymph skins. Clutter can also serve as hiding places for bed bugs.

Vacuuming

Bed bugs are excellent hitchhikers and can be transported into your home by bags, purses, backpacks, or other personal items. It is important to vacuum all the areas of your home where they might hide, including the inside of closets and drawers.

Vacuuming is an effective way to remove many of the adult bed bugs and their eggs. However, this method is not a complete solution. It is a good idea to vacuum every surface in your home at least once per day, especially the corners, edges, seams, and cracks. Vacuum cleaners with a nozzle attachment or crevice tool are particularly useful in dislodging bed bug clumps and eggs. Be sure to empty the vacuum bag immediately after each use.

Vacuuming also helps to remove the chemicals that are absorbed by furniture and other surfaces from spraying. This makes the effectiveness of Aprehend and other residual treatments more effective. If you have a lot of clothing, personal items, or luggage that are infested with punaise de lit, it is a good idea to steam them on a hot day and pack the infested items in black bags before bringing them into your home.

Heat Treatment

Bed bugs can survive in cold temperatures, but they die when exposed to higher levels of heat. That’s why professional pest control companies offer heat treatment as a way to kill the bugs and their eggs. These technicians wheel large electric heaters into infested rooms and crank up the temperature to 118 degrees Fahrenheit, which is hot enough to kill them but not too high for comfortable living spaces.

This method is most effective when combined with other treatments, such as chemical sprays and encasements. It is also one of the safest ways to get rid of bed bugs.

During the heat treatment, it’s best not to move furniture or other items around. This can cause the bugs to escape the room and re-infest it. Instead, sprinkle the area with talcum powder to keep the bed bugs trapped in their hiding places. Make sure to use interceptor traps under the legs of infested furniture, and check and replace them often.

Insecticide Sprays

Many different types of bug sprays exist to help repel or kill pests such as ants, mosquitoes, fleas and flies. Most insecticide sprays contain chemicals that target bugs by attacking their nervous systems or by damaging the protective coating on their bodies.

Aerosol insecticides typically work by discharging a fine mist of chemicals that will settle on surfaces and kill any insects that come into contact with it. Most of these sprays contain pyrethrins, which are natural oils extracted from chrysanthemum flowers, or their synthetic relatives, called pyrethroids. They attack an insect’s central and peripheral nervous systems, causing tremors, paralysis and death [source: National Pesticide Information Center].

Other chemical pesticides include carbamates, which inhibit enzymes in the nervous system that break down the neurotransmitter acetylcholine. This prevents neurons from sending the message to muscles to contract. Other pesticides, like microbial insecticides, use living organisms to kill or deter insects by infecting them. Microbial insecticides tend to be less toxic to humans and the environment than their chemical counterparts.

Pest Control

When you know you have bed bugs, double bag all personal items like books, papers and CDs and set them aside until they can be carefully treated, cleaned or inspected. Washables should be sorted and either laundered in hot water or dry cleaned. Non-washables can be isolated in black plastic bags and placed in direct sunlight for 2-5 months to kill them (the warmer the bag, the shorter the survival time).

Summary:

After you encase your mattress, box spring and bed frame, use insecticide sprays or dusts to thoroughly treat every crack, crevice and nook. These are the areas where most of the eggs hatch. If you are using a pest control company to do your treatment, make sure they are licensed and insured, interview them extensively regarding their experience and procedures and ask what their success rate is with treating bed bug infestations. Also, they should be able to schedule you as soon as possible and return to your home for follow up treatments if necessary.