It begins with Al Grable, local Pest Control Operator (PCO):

While there have apparently been no official bedbug complaints lodged against any Walla Walla county motels, local residents can’t rest easily.

Al Grable, owner of Agreeable Pest Control in College Place, knows better. The pest expert has treated apartments, homes and motels throughout the area. And, although he declined to name the hospitality facilities, one was severly infested, he found. “And it was one of the better ones.”

When it comes to bugs, Grable gives legs to his profession. He taught entomology at Walla Walla College for 28 years and has vanquished pests for 15 years since retirement from teaching. He is certified with the Entomological Society of America and a member of the National Pest Management Association.

His first case of bedbugs came about four years ago, catching him by surprise, Grable remembered.

Clearly, local motels do have bed bugs, and Grable is treating them. But not one customer has called the local health department to complain about this. That may be because it doesn’t occur to travelers to do so.

Those planning travel in Washington can get some help, said Shannon Walker with the Washington state Department of Health. Her office inspects and oversees lodging businesses throughout the state.

With the increased publicity about bedbugs, her desk is crawling with requests for hotel and motel inspection reports. People want to about any multi-legged guests before making a reservation, she said from her office in Olympia.

Many consumers are unaware they can get such information or lodge their own complaint with the state, Walker said. “I’ll take a complaint in any way. They can call me, they can e-mail, they can fax it.”

No one will make a pest out of themselves in doing so, she promised. “I love it when people call me.”

FOR YOUR INFORMATION

If you encounter bedbugs while lodged in Washington, the state Department of Health wants to know, at (800) 633-6828, by fax at (360) 236-2901 or at shannon.walker @doh.wa.gov.

There is no centralized location for such information in Oregon; travelers must check with each county health department.

This article focuses on the Washington State Health Department as a place to report hotel bed bugs, as well as a place to check whether a hotel has bed bugs before you stay there. (Don’t assume that a hotel with no bed bug reports is bed bug free, though, since obviously everyone does not yet know to report them in this way.)

We haven’t really seen local health authorities inviting the public to enquire about bed bugs, or report bed bugs, in this way. But now that I read this, I am inclined to think that anyone who has experienced bed bugs in a hotel or motel should not only report them to the hotel or motel, but also to the county and/or state health departments.

If you encounter bed bugs in a Washington State hotel or motel, call the health department listed above. If you encounter them in another state, find out what county you are staying in, and google the county health department, as well as the state health department, to notify them of your experience. Doing so is not about revenge. It’s about letting others know where bed bugs lurk. And with the government, it’s about letting them know how bad the problem is–so we can all get some help with this. The government needs to know our concerns.

Travelers should also post a review on tripadvisor.com which details their experience in the particular hotel. This warns others of your experiences. I always check tripadvisor before I book a hotel, and I follow up once in the hotel by carefully searching the room for bed bugs (the CBC video gives a detailed demonstration).

• Rockford, IL: half of Red Roof Inn shut down due to bed bugs
• bed bugs in Virginia Beach (again), Brown County, Ohio, and potential health risks
• Bed bugs on increase in Ripley County, Indiana
• Alton, Illinois, motel: blaming the bedbug victim

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For those of you who don’t know, webpages can tell where you’re coming from (though not very specifically). They know the location of your ISP. For most people, this comes up as somewhere near where they live, though it’s not always precise and sometimes it’s just the country. It also tells the webmaster what internet browser you use (Go Firefox!) and whether you like Macs or Windows machines. No, I do not know your name, or where you live, don’t worry!

This may all seem very “meta,” so far, but we know that our readership consists of four kinds of people:

a) People who have, or think they have, or recently had, bed bugs.
b) People whose work makes them concerned about bed bugs (pest control professionals, entomologists, politicians, landlords, hotel managers, social service agencies, government officials, are just some sectors that I have heard from).
c) People who have heard about bed bugs and are concerned, and want to know more.

I think that group (a) is in the majority, and although most people don’t comment, most commenters fit in group a. In any case, the Bedbugger.com readership is a map of bed bug concern, and you’d be pretty safe betting its a map of where bed bugs are popping up–with the caveat, of course, that our site pops up more in US search engines than those abroad, and also that our readers are overwhelmingly English-speakers, though we have dreams of breaking down those linguistic barriers!

This is where the last 89 readers were reading the blog (circa 6:30 this evening):

1. San Diego, California, United States
2. Nottingham, Nottingham, United Kingdom
3. Walden, New York, United States
4. Long Island City, New York, United States
5. New York, New York, United States
6. Plattekill, New York, United States
7. Hull, Quebec, Canada
8. Durant, Iowa, United States
9. Miamiville, Ohio, United States
10. Gibraltar
11. Calgary, Alberta, Canada
12. Boston, Massachusetts, United States
13. Humble, Texas, United States
14. Germantown, Maryland, United States
15. Rowland Heights, California, United States
16. New York, New York, United States
17. New York, New York, United States
18. Hadley, Kentucky, United States
19. Buffalo, New York, United States
20. Hveragerði, Arnessysla, Iceland
21. Pine Falls, Manitoba, Canada
22. Livonia, Michigan, United States
23. Bayside, New York, United States
24. Woodhaven, New York, United States
25. Denver, Colorado, United States
26. New York, New York, United States
27. United States
28. Waterloo, Quebec, Canada
29. Los Angeles, California, United States
30. Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada
31. Santa Maria, California, United States
32. Beamsville, Ontario, Canada
33. Kansas City, Missouri, United States
34. Corona, New York, United States
35. Barker, Texas, United States
36. Readville, Massachusetts, United States
37. Palo Alto, California, United States
38. Salt Lake City, Utah, United States
39. Mill Valley, California, United States
40. Ridgewood, New York, United States
41. Mehama, Oregon, United States
42. San Francisco, California, United States
43. Feeding Hills, Massachusetts, United States
44. Swedesburg, Iowa, United States
45. Dublin, Dublin, Ireland
46. West New York, New Jersey, United States
47. Lancaster, Blackpool, United Kingdom
48. New York, New York, United States
49. Miami, Florida, United States
50. Anaheim, California, United States
51. Harrow, Harrow, United Kingdom
52. Wilsonville, Oregon, United States
53. Sheffield, Sheffield, United Kingdom
54. Forest Hill, Ontario, Canada
55. Wayne, New Jersey, United States
56. Kecskemét, Bacs-Kiskun, Hungary
57. Port Coquitlam, British Columbia, Canada
58. Short Hills, New Jersey, United States
59. Seattle, Washington, United States
60. Jackson, Mississippi, United States
61. Tulsa, Oklahoma, United States
62. Secaucus, New Jersey, United States
63. Long Island City, New York, United States
64. United States
65. Tranbjerg, Arhus, Denmark
66. Naples, Florida, United States
67. San Francisco, California, United States
68. Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
69. Gainesville, Florida, United States
70. Edmond, Oklahoma, United States
71. Hempstead, New York, United States
72. Everett, Massachusetts, United States
73. United States
74. United States
75. São Paulo, Sao Paulo, Brazil
76. Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada
77. Bismarck, North Dakota, United States
78. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States
79. Downers Grove, Illinois, United States
80. United States
81. Bend, Oregon, United States
82. Henderson, Nevada, United States
83. Montréal, Quebec, Canada
84. Sunnyvale, California, United States
85. Arlington, Texas, United States
86. United States
87. New York, New York, United States
88. Fairfax, Virginia, United States
89. Rochester, New York, United States

You might expect that most of these people came from the bed bug hot spots. We get lots of readers from Chicago, Boston, NYC, San Francisco, Vancouver, Toronto. So it’s surprising that 89 people came from such a wide variety of places:

68 from at least 33 states (only 12 of these from NYC, San Francisco or Boston);
11 from 5 provinces in Canada;
4 from 4 cities in the UK (none of them London);
1 person each from: Hungary, Ireland, Denmark, Brazil, Iceland, and Gilbraltar.

In New York state, 10 of the 17 visitors were from NYC. And of the 10 in NYC, 60% were in Queens, where, unlike Staten Island, Brooklyn, the Bronx and Manhattan, each neighborhood has its own name used for the purposes of the postal service: Ridgewood, Corona, Long Island City, Woodhaven, Bayside, New York, are all in Queens, and part of NYC. Remember the Queens Gazette speculating that Queens was the “ground zero for NYC’s bed bugs? Well, I am still not sure it’s true, but it seems plausible: we certainly have a lot of Bedbuggers in Queens.

I peeked at the traffic report for the site because I have a geeky side and I find it interesting to know where you’re coming from. However, looking at it can tell us something about the bed bug problem. This is not a scientific study, but just a snapshot of our site’s traffic does tell you who’s worried about bed bugs (and, we can assume, many are worried because they have bed bugs).

Most of those cities were not capitals or the biggest cities in their regions or countries. A small percentage are from those places you think are hot spots. It should serve as a warning sign that bed bugs, like Bedbuggers, are everywhere, and way more spread out than you thought.

• California fights bed bugs: good news from the golden state
• Portsmouth NH’s Health Officer proactive about bed bugs
• Comedian moves into NJ Ikea store
• Tracing the path of the epidemic

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I posted last week about an article an author wrote on the NY Indymedia site about his attempts to live with bedbugs (he intends to live alongside them, and yet avoid being bitten). He’s now posted a second article in the Portland Indymedia site, arguing that:

Therefore I have isolated my bed. I am sleeping ‘tight’, and I just will not let those bed bugs bite. Bed bugs have trouble climbing the side of a metal coffee tin, which some people use around the bottom of their bed posts. I am using the highly polished slipper surface of a stainless steel bowl, since if bed bugs have trouble with a coffee can, I am sure they will have even more trouble walking upside down up the slippery slope of that stainless steel bowl. Inside the stainless steel bowl I have water. I have been considering adding some insecticide, but even water would probably be good enough. You see a soaking wed (sic) bed bug can hardly walk, due to the extra weight of that water, and therefore, since I have greased my metal bed posts with slippery vaseline, it seems unlikely that such an overburdened creature will be able to pull its soaking wet carcass vertically up that greased pole. I have a glue trap consisting of double sided carpet tape further up the pole. I am wrapping my mattress and box spring, trapping bed bugs inside where they will starve to death. I am adding on tropical insect netting, as an extra barrier. I will be putting a six inch barrier of fresh water Diatomaceous Earth around the stainless steel bowls (do not use the salt water variety as it is unsafe, and keep in mind that there is an inhalation risk when spreadin this substance). This substance cuts the shell of crawling insects and causes them to dehydrate and die within 48 hours. The bed bug will also be falling upside off that stainless steel bowl I am sure and landing on that DE a few times I am sure and getting cut up a little more each time. If need be I will pitch a tent, using velcro or duct tape around the zipper each night, since immature bed bugs are small that a pin head and can make it through a zipper.

In short I am going to “sleep ‘tight’ and I will not let the bed bugs bite. After all, I am a human and those things are bugs. They know that, which is why I am sure that these bed bugs are real sorry they got caught since now they can’t get away with it anymore. For you see, if someone has bed bugs, that means it is their own fault. Instead of feeling sorry for people who are telling horror stories about bed bugs, a common sense response would be to say to them, ‘you aren’t letting them bite you, are you?’ They do not have a ‘moral responsiblity’ to increase pesticide usage by spraying bed bugs, thus sparing their neighbours the ordeal of possible infection, but rather everyone has a moral responsibility to not allow a bed bug to bite them, because if the allow bed bugs to bite them, they will nest, then breed, and then move on in greater numbers to bite you neighbour, which would be your fault, since you did not sleep ‘tight’, but instead you just let some damned bed bug bite you, which was morally wrong, since now it will be biting someone else.

Respondents to his earlier article suggested that if he does not try and eliminate the bed bugs from his home, beyond a simple ring of DE around his bed legs (remember, he saw a bunch of them running from the bed together–this is not a small infestation), that he will spread them to his neighbors who will, in turn, use pesticides (the thing he is trying to avoid). He seems to miss the point, thinking that the bedbugs won’t bite him if they can’t bite him at night, and that they will simply walk away to the neighbors’.

If you do not have bed bugs now, the best thing to do since their is plague of pesticide resistant bed bugs now sweeping the country, is to prepare in advance by taking such steps as I described above, or other steps as seem sensible to you. In the days ahead, a bed bug will coming by to check out your pad, and when it finds out that it can’t bite you, it will shove off and move next door and bite your neighbout, provided that your neighbour is morally irresponsible, and decides to host and feed a nest of bed bugs, in which case you should not feel sorry for your neighbour or feel guilty for having sent that bed bug next door when it found out it couldn’t bite you, but rather you should give your neighbour shit for doing something so stupid as allowing themselves to be bitten by a bed bug, thus spreading the plague even more, instead of starving that bed bug to death, a solution for which a bed bug has no known resistance, nor could it ever develop such resistance.

So then “sleep ‘tight’ and whatever you do, don’t let those bed bugs bite,” for your neighbours are going to spraying bed bugs like mad now that the pesticides aren’t working anymore, which means that we are going to be putting up with a virulent plague for quite some time, and you might as well adapt to the new reality right now and start getting used to the idea that the world has suddenly changed for you. And if you hear about someone else who has been bitten by a bed bug, be sure to give them supreme shit for allowing that to happen, and just tell them the same thing our ancestors used to tell anyone who pissed them off by being bitten by a bed bug, thus keeping those around for another generation - ‘Sleep ‘tight’ and don’t let the bed bugs bite.’

Please understand that I am trying to be respectful of this fellow’s views, and I have no interest in any kind of online arguing. I have commented on his previous article, always respectfully. But I do think his view is misguided, and indeed, that it will lead to more pesticides, and not fewer, being used in the long run. I also think its dangerous not to fight bed bugs. This is my response, which I posted as a comment on the new article:

You should realize that while isolating your bed can keep them from biting you at night, bed bugs will also bite you in the daytime. They will bite you if you sit at a desk chair, or a dinner table, or on any other surface. And since they can live for between 12-18 months without feeding, they will stick around that long, waiting to bite you or anyone else who enters your home. If not treated, they will also spread to your neighbors. If your neighbors get them (or already have them), then you will be living with every chair, table, and bed in bowls of water indefinitely. I hope that your insect netting is completely enclosed, that you do not lean against any part of it, and that it has no gaps; mosquito netting is open and tucked under you, and does not keep out bed bugs (remember, the 1st instar nymphs are the size of a speck of dust).

You also need to know that if you saw “a bunch of bed bugs” running when you woke up in the night, you are likely to have a sizeable infestation.

Another alternative to pesticides (or to living this way forever) is heat treatment, which I would think you’d agree is a good alternative to pesticides and gassing. I believe there may be multiple companies doing this, but the one I’m aware of is ThermaPure ( http://www.thermapure.com/ps_bedbugs.php). It’s expensive and is not available in all areas (like NYC where I am–it’s illegal in NY State), but may be available in Portland. They heat the home to 150 degrees F for 4+ hours, and it kills nymphs, adults, and eggs.

We should all be campaigning that this be made legal in all localities since you’re right that we want to avoid pesticide-resistant bedbugs, but we also (most of us would agree) want to get rid of bed bugs. According to the CDC (check their website), bedbugs have been tested to carry Hepatitis B, and they have also been found to carry HIV infected blood for one hour; and though there have not been known cases of transmission, we know that these things can change. God forbid HIV or even Hepatitis B begin to be transmitted from one person to another in places where people share housing. If everyone allows their bed bugs to live in their homes, as you’re kind of suggesting we do, this is a possible outcome.

We’re all interrelated, here on earth, and your choosing to allow these bugs to continue living and spreading affects others too. When those others start spraying pesticides, you’ll have caused more damage, indirectly, because more spraying will have been done than if you yourself attempted to eliminate your infestation.

I’d like to have written more, because there’s a lot else that can be responded to. But I responded twice to the other article and once to this. I leave it to others to fill in the gaps by commenting on the Indymedia sites themselves.

The bottom line is this: the war on bedbugs must be fought with education, teamwork, and will involve destruction. If you’re serious about avoiding pesticides, seriously, start campaigning for thermal treatments to be legalized in your locality. Don’t develop elaborate theories about how an insect is going to get tired of waiting to bite you and go elsewhere (when they’ve been known to live, unfed, for 12-18 months). And do a bit more research: they bite in the daytime too. It doesn’t take much research to discover this.

• More bed bug stories from Cincinnati; also, pig spotted in sky over New York City
• don’t think you can fight bed bugs without pesticides
• Bowling Green Towers: another infestation in elderly and disabled housing
• Brent Herbert’s plans for bed bug world domination!

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