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BB Alert Active Inexpensive Bed Bug Monitor
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We have a brand new inexpensive bed bug monitor that is hitting the US marketplace very soon that we are very interested in finding out what you think about it. It is called BB Alert.
You can visit our website for more information, product pictures, and a PDF of the vendors instruction manual. Link: http://www.sternenvironmental.com/products/BB-alert.php
We think that it is a very cool and innovative concept and priced for the mass market.
I would very much appreciate your feed back on the product. We are very bullish on it and feel that not only will home owners be able to afford it for monitoring, but for people who have had a treatment it will also give them peace of mind that the treatment has worked.
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Tamales
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Joined: Jul '09
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Posted 3 months ago
Thu Jul 16 2009 11:44:38
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How soon is very soon? Exactly how much will it cost?
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goawaybugs
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Posts: 126
Posted 3 months ago
Thu Jul 16 2009 12:10:07
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This looks very interesting. Is it related to the one that David Cain created?
I had a couple of questions:
1. Does the monitor require that the room be vacated? What makes it more attractive than a sleeping human?
2. Bugs don't always stick to glue traps. Removing the lid to inspect sounds potentially risky--what if there's a bug that manages to escape while being inspected?
3. Have there been field tests run on the active monitors? Just wondering how often it worked in very light situations.
Many thanks.
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Hi,
The BB alert active is not my technology but I will be working on it in the next few months.
The BB alert passive technology is the one I have been working on for the last few years and the one I have great results for in both domestic and commercial settings.
In terms of a release date for the passive technology we are still working on the contracts and the manufacturing line so supply is still in small volumes only. We do however have an agreed date by which manufacturing has to be at full capacity.
I am hoping to announce that information in the next 7 days.
David
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goawaybugs
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Posted 3 months ago
Thu Jul 16 2009 17:36:03
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Thanks nobugs and David.
David, I'll be interested to know your thoughts on the active monitor once you've had a chance to work with it, and which of the two (active versus passive) you think is best for which situation. I'm very glad to know the inactive will soon be available here as well. From everything I've heard, it sounds great.
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Hi,
The answer to that is part of the story of how they came about. The manufacturers of the BB alert active came to me to discuss the product and I said "great idea but its only part of the solution, this will help in the identification of live samples but what we really need is something to allow early detection and if you want to know what that looks like please sign this confidential disclosure agreement", the rest is why i have been so busy.
Basically they work in two very different ways. BB Alert active is designed to work on attracting and dealing with live samples in a similar way to what we have seen with the more electronic active devices such as CDC3000 and NightWatch. They are if you like a step between these devices and glue board traps but they only work in dealing with live samples.
The passive monitor which will be available as BB Alert passive is design to detect the early signs of an infestation using a complex strategy of bed bug behaviour and taxic responses. When bed bugs enter into an environment and search for a blood meal they will often seek an ideal home close to the host. We provide this in the product but also an easy way to detect faecal traces and this is the first bed bug monitor specifically designed to be able to detect live samples, cast skins and faecal traces. It was originally designed to show when a location was recently infested so that treatment could be started before the issue spread and developed. This fulfilled my desire to catch infestations earlier so they could be easily dealt with and contained to specific areas. One of our field trial sites realised that weekly inspection could result in the early detection of an infestation and one soon realised that if caught in the first 7 days some infestations could be dealt with by simply isolating the monitor to a zip loc bag and putting a new one on the bed.
The best I can tell you is at this stage the passive technology is optimised for use in early detection and works best in environments which have not been power washed with insecticides.
I have been conducting a study on the use of three types of monitoring and treatment in a property but it would not be scientific to discuss the results until the study is complete.
I appreciate that may will want lots of answers some of which I am sorry I will not be able to answer at this point in time. I will however say that the bed bug landscape has certainly improved a lot in the last few years and once I get some free time or a digital video camera I will do some notes on ways to live bed bug free without the use to quantities of chemicals, organic, synthetic, natural, spiritual or even invoking the curse of the old country.
I have not worked with the other products as much as I have with the passives so I cant answer technical questions or suggest protocols. We unfortunately do not have the luxury of a spare detached property to infect and test new approaches with our services clients remain more focused on getting rid of the issue in the fastest possible time which is with our established methods at this stage.
A little more long winded than I had planned.
David
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Joined: Oct '08
Posts: 83
Posted 3 months ago
Fri Jul 17 2009 10:12:12
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This is a little of an awkward post for me as I have friends in the bed bug world that are trying to promote this product but I guess it is what it is....
We've worked with the BB Alert that Doug Stern is speaking about above and have been pretty unimpressed by the results to the point that in the limited time we've used it in the field we haven't collected any bugs. That’s not to say that it can’t collect bugs because I think it can, but in the few places we have set them we have not collected any. I've also spoken with other researchers who have been relatively unimpressed with the results as well.
The trap, for the most part, is using heat to lure bed bugs to it. Heat and it’s attractiveness to bed bugs has been documented many times in research papers. Although researchers have found heat to be attractive to bed bugs in lab tests, if you review Anderson et al.’s paper from the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station on the attractiveness of heat, a chemical lure and carbon dioxide you will quickly see that the results they documented in the lab where heat was attractive to bed bugs was different then what they documented in the field where heat was no more attractive than a control (no lures). Heat, although it is part of the attraction "picture" for bed bugs, by itself is not as effective as the entire picture. The following link is to a presentation I found online that includes the statistical analysis of the previously mentioned paper. The statistical analysis of the paper is contained in slides 10-13. If you don’t understand statistical analysis it may not make any sense to you but for those that can here it is. http://www.ct.gov/caes/lib/caes/documents/bed_bugs/bed_bug_research_anderson.pdf
On the flip side I agree with Doug in that it is an inexpensive monitor that is priced for the masses and I don't think it can hurt to put some of these out, but I'm not convinced it is that much more reliable than a sticky trap with no lure. At this point I wouldn't use it to declare a room free of bugs.
In response to the question about the sensitivity of the active bed bug monitors. We are writing a filming a review on the CDC 3000 right now that will shed some light on the topic. It should be up by early next week and provide some real insight on the sensitivity of the unit. Until we're done filming I don't want to comment too much on the content but “unimpressed” and “questionable” would be the adjectives I would use to sum it up. I'll post the link and text review once it's up.
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goawaybugs
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Posted 3 months ago
Fri Jul 17 2009 12:23:40
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This is all so helpful. Thanks David and JWhite for your feedback. I really appreciate your taking the time to share your insights with us.
It sounds like the passive may be more useful than the active. David, I'm curious to know whether the passive (which I think includes some cardboard?) is always a more attractive draw than any other place in the room. What if there is cardboard elsewhere in the room? What if a couple bugs have already set up shop before the monitor is introduced? Will they change locations? If and when the passive makes it here, I would love to hear more information like this.
And, JWhite, if you have had a chance to try out the passive, I would be interested in your feedback as well. The results of the active are disappointing but, unfortunately, consistent with what we always read on these boards.
p.s. The tips on living bug-free sound great, too! But I particularly like the idea that checking the passive monitor on a weekly basis might not only identify but also eradicate early infestations. If the monitor can be relied upon to consistently pick up all entering bugs, folks wouldn't need to obsess as much about picking up a stray bug somewhere (e.g., coat checks, library books, movie theater, etc.) since a weekly inspection of the monitor would solve things.
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Hi goawaybugs,
The design is a little more complex than just cardboard and it takes into account behavior, model envrionments and ideal living conditions for bed bugs.
We have found that if already present bed bugs will usually relocate to the monitor within 24 - 72 hours but this does depend upon their feeding habits, after all we are dealing with a biological organism and they do have some variability. The best results as I said have been achieved in locations which have not been over exposed to insecticides and I suspect the chemotaxic response is greater than the nesting instinct. We have however got many case notes on existing bugs relocating within a short space of time, some within hours but most cases a day or two.
If the bed bug is introduced after the monitor is installed the location means that any active bed bugs will usually find it before or shortly after they have obtained a blood meal. I am also overdue finishing a newsletter or preparing areas post infestation to reduce the key target refugia which will in a way be a form of super charging your passive to ensure they have little or no choice but to use it.
I think Jeff has seen a passive but I am not sure if we have sent him some yet (PM me if I have not Jeff and I will get some in the post to you).
I should know more by the end of next week but the target date for manufacturing and supply to the US is before the years end although as I have said early adopters can contact my office for late stage prototypes which are what we have been installing in commercial settings all summer. We now have over 1,000 of them in field locations including a few small hotels that have been using them for 5 months now and are yet to need chemical treatment despite the fact that they get at least 1 infestation event each month.
If you are looking for a top tip then I would suggest that climbup interceptors have a good isolation trap and would work well in conjunction with the passives which will show any bugs that get past them. I do not mean past in terms of a bed bug getting through the climbup but as a solution to deal with the ones that learn to get around the isolation. True 100% bed isolation is extremely difficult to achieve and maintain in most domestic and commercial settings which is one of the main reasons why my treatment strategy has always avoided isolation and mattress encasement in favour of the deal with it head on and get it cleared faster approach.
But being pedantic for a second it is in fact the only true monitoring technology as it is not designed to trap, isolate or kill the bed bugs which all the other systems do. At some stage I will go on the rampage to correct the language use on all the products but for the time being I am just happy that we have options.
David
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goawaybugs
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Posts: 126
Posted 3 months ago
Sat Jul 18 2009 1:07:25
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Hi David,
I was going to PM you, but then I thought others might be interested so I'm posting here. I find it fascinating that the bugs relocate to the monitor--one of these days, if there are no trade secrets involved, I'd be interested to understand why.
In the meantime, I'm curious to know about how laypeople can inspect the monitor. Is it easy to identify whether any bugs caught in there are bedbugs? (Even baby ones?) Somehow, the thought of putting my face near an exposed bug (e.g., with a loupe, to see better) scares me. Would moving the monitor for a closer inspection risk having the bugs run out of the monitor and away?
Ideally, I'm hoping a climbup wouldn't be needed, so the passive could be reliably used even where a climbup doesn't fit. I also wonder how well it works outside the bedroom where there's more furniture and potential hiding places.
Anyway, this sounds very promising. Thanks for taking the time to explain.
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Badwolf
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Joined: Jul '09
Posts: 31
Posted 3 months ago
Sat Jul 18 2009 2:31:51
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JWhiteBBCTV - Do you have any plans on testing out the NightWatch monitors?
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Hi goawaybugs,
For the finer details you will need to wait till the patent is published but basically a lot of the monitor design is based on observations of over 5,000 cases when I started to design it and now we are over 11,500 cases and counting. One of the fundemental claims we have made is the device specifically designed to identify faecal traces as well as cast skins and live samples. The claim on faecal traces and cast skins is unique.
Depending upon your eye sight you can read the monitor from a distance of a few meters and it remains attached to the surface when you read it so there is no risk of bugs coming into contact with you. The detection skirt shows the faecal traces which can then be confirmed with a smear test. Details of all of this are provided with the monitors we supply as they are part of the training and system pack we have already developed. In another 12 - 18 months we will also have an electronic way of reading them but that will take a lot of time and resources to finish.
At present we have focused on beds but I have an adaptation that we will launch in 2010 designed for non bed situations, I just need to get the first one widely available first so that it pays the massive development costs. Its been an expensive few years in development for us as I am sure you can appreciate.
The biggest issue we have at present is lack of hours in the day to keep up with things, every few months we review our processes and customer documentation. It started in 2005 at 2 sided of paper and is currently 46 pages. The next re-write will most likely take it to over 50 pages but i am one of those that would rather over communicate than under.
Hope that helps.
David
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junior member
Joined: Oct '08
Posts: 83
Posted 3 months ago
Sat Jul 18 2009 9:30:37
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David I have seen the passive monitor. We have one of them but haven't worked with them yet so can't comment on their effectiveness.
Badwolf, we do have plans to test the Nightwatch and should be getting some in the next few weeks. It'll probably take us some time to get out and test them so I wouldn't expect any results for a few months but we will have it eventually.
We didn't film the CDC 3000 update yesterday (producer took the day off) but plan on filming early next week and will hopefully have it up sometime next week.
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MyWorstFear
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Posted 3 months ago
Sun Jul 19 2009 20:53:51
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David, any idea what the passive monitor will cost? If I'm reading correctly, this device doesn't need electricity and thus it could be used anywhere in the world? Any plans for a waitlist as I'd like to be on it. Thank you so much.
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goawaybugs
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Joined: Nov '07
Posts: 126
Posted 3 months ago
Sun Jul 19 2009 21:29:50
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Hi David,
Will there almost always be evidence on the skirting, so there is no need to look inside the monitor? (I'm thinking of someone with average, but perhaps not great, eyesight who might not be able to spot one from far away).
In any case, these sound great. Please keep us posted on any further updates, including arrival dates in the US.
Jeff, if you ever have time to work with these, I'd be very interested in your assessment as well. (And Sean's, if he's reading!)
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MyWorstFear - 7 hours ago »
David, any idea what the passive monitor will cost? If I'm reading correctly, this device doesn't need electricity and thus it could be used anywhere in the world? Any plans for a waitlist as I'd like to be on it. Thank you so much.Hi,
We are selling them in the UK for £15 GBP per unit plus post and packaging. You are correct that they do not require power or consumables. The operation is as simple as you peel of the backing and stick it down to the surface in the bed and check it weekly, bi-weekly or monthly depending upon your bed bug risk profile.
There is currently a waiting list of only 6 - 24 hours which is between processing the order and getting to the post office, i.e. they are in stock as late stage prototypes, fully functional but we have changed the design fractionally between this version and what will be commercially available later in the year. The change is simply to accommodate a better adhesive to anchor the product to the surfaces in the room.
But yes it is designed to be able to install in any location in any country although it is not designed to be portable, you install in one location and monitor rather than travel with it.
Hope that helps.
David
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goawaybugs - 7 hours ago »
Hi David,
Will there almost always be evidence on the skirting, so there is no need to look inside the monitor? (I'm thinking of someone with average, but perhaps not great, eyesight who might not be able to spot one from far away).Hi goawaybugs,
The behavioural response to leaving faecal traces means that most are left on the detection skirt in plain sight and because of the colour contrast you are looking for black pen like marks on a near white surface, the contrast really helps in detecting them.
Obviously the distance to accurate read does depend upon your eye sight and my team are renowned for detecting small things but please understand that the main use of the system will be in commercial settings where we rely upon the chamber staff and house keepers to read and check it. In this type of environment we have built in quality control steps and ways of monitoring the system but it was 100% developed a long time ago.
I would say that most people will be able to accurately read the monitor at a distance of 2 foot. If I have time over the next few days I will update the monitors section of the website to include some images and a little more product information.
Postal to the US is currently 4 to 5 days so arrival could be immenant.
David
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