What to do?

Time magazine reported on one way of cutting down the population. (Warning: you have to skim past commentary on “ignorant and indolent” bedbugged Europeans to get to this.)

Last week one who has been vexed by Athenian bedbug pricks, Dr. N. T. Lorando, chief physician of the Evangelismos Hospital and Near East Relief at Athens, published in Scientific Monthly a learned treatise on bedbugs and biological bedbug hunters.

In the U. S., Dr. Lorando’s research reveals, red house ants attack bedbugs, dismember them, carry off body fragments to their nests. Florida peasants advocate introducing the ants artificially to homes.

Cockroaches are also voracious bedbug hunters so. in some places, is the kissing or assassin bug.

Disclaimer: no, you do not want red house ants, cockroaches, kissing or assassin bugs in your home. Centipedes also eat bed bugs, but they can sting if perturbed, so don’t call in troops of centipedes. None of this is a good bed bug treatment plan.

That out of the way, this is the juicy part:

But the insect of choice, in Dr. Lorando’s experience is Thanatos flavidus Simon, a spider. Bedbugs will run from an irate human, but they apparently have no fear of Thanatos flavidus Simon. He catches the bugs by their backs and sucks out their blood and juices until only a shell remains. So efficacious is Thanatos flavidus Simon that he thoroughly cleaned an Athenian suburb where bedbugs were so thick that householders were obliged to sweep them off the floors and sidewalks. Dr. Lorando reports that the spider is not poisonous to humans, is less objectionable about the house than are ants, cockroaches or kissing bugs.

Why can’t I find any photos on google images of, or other relevant links to “Thanatos flavidus Simon”?

Perhaps some of our friendly, neighborhood entomologists can tell us if something was spelled wrong by Time.

Could Thanatos flavidus Simon really have “cleaned an Athenian subsurb” of bed bugs?

Could this spider be of any use today?

I have a hunch we first have to find out what moniker he’s really using…

Time was referencing this article, which I am currently tracking down:

LORANDO, N. T., 1929: A biological method of destroying bedbugs. Sci. Monthly 29, 265-268.

Thanks to spideyjg, apparently an arachnid fan, for sharing this link in the forums.

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When Mark Malkoff thought about where he could stay while his New York City apartment was being fumigated for cockroaches, he quickly ruled out friends’ places (too small) and hotels (too expensive).

Instead, the comedian and filmmaker decided to move into an Ikea store in suburban New Jersey, where on Monday he unloaded two suitcases into a spacious bedroom at the store.

His wife went to stay with relatives.

So this is a question for all the PCOs out there. Do apartments get evacuated so that you can treat for cockroaches?!?

I must have bed bugs on the brain, but when I hear someone from Queens is being “fumigated,” I assume they mean pest control treatment, not fumigation per se, and I also wonder if it’s not our smaller, rust-colored friends.

See the ABC7 news item here.

Mark is blogging his big blue box experience here.

• an honest PCO, a clever move
• Letter from a reader: 4 months after exposure and two treatments, bites persist
• Ryerson University: a study in unenthusiastic bed bug control practices
• Reader question: How to move and leave bed bugs behind?

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