does sitting on the couch during the day attract bed bugs?

Got Bed Bugs? Bedbugger Forums » General Topics

does sitting on the couch during the day attract bed bugs?

(5 posts)

Tags:

couch

shiry7

newbite
Joined: Sep '11
Posts: 22
offline

Posted 1 year ago
Mon Oct 3 2011 11:23:24
#

Login to Send PM

since I discovered I have bed bugs, I've been spending a lot more time in my living room and on my couch during the day. I also spend more time at home in general as a kind of self-quarantine. I wonder if I'm making a mistake doing this. will my presence on the couch attract bed bugs even though I do sleep in my bed at night?
onmylastnerve

junior member
Joined: Sep '11
Posts: 44
offline

Posted 1 year ago
Mon Oct 3 2011 12:02:18
#

Login to Send PM

I'm not a expert by any means but I do know that I ended up with them in my sofa along with all our beds all my furniture had to be treated. I was told anywhere you spend a lot of time you'll get them. they follow your carbon you exhale. Hope this helps
Bedbug_Undertaker

junior member
Joined: Sep '11
Posts: 53
offline

Posted 1 year ago
Mon Oct 3 2011 12:46:47
#

Login to Send PM

The way we work over here ... if you're feeding them regularly and sleeping in your bed every night and taking care not to bring anything out of the bedroom which they could hitch a ride on, then they should in theory be happy to stay close to their food source and remain in the bedroom. However, if someone is regularly bringing them into the property then the first drop off point would be the couch if they were sitting there in the clothing they brought them into the property on.
Personally I remove my outdoor clothes as soon as I enter my property and isolate them into a plastic bag, especially when coming home from work.
makesmenuts

member
Joined: Aug '11
Posts: 149
offline

Posted 1 year ago
Tue Oct 4 2011 13:14:53
#

Login to Send PM

I got them in my couch, but I'm almost positive it was a hitchhiking situation. Once you bring 'em there, they'll likely stay if you sit there a lot and give them a ready food supply. I was almost convinced I was allergic to my couch before I realized we had BBs because I was always "breaking out" in little red bumps when sitting there. They never moved to the loveseat because it's seldom used.
buggyinsocal

oldtimer
Joined: Jun '08
Posts: 2,440
offline

Posted 1 year ago
Tue Oct 4 2011 13:43:58
#

Login to Send PM

I wonder if I'm making a mistake doing this. will my presence on the couch attract bed bugs even though I do sleep in my bed at night?

All other things being equal, the short answer is no.

Of course, it's a post from me, so there's a longer answer too.

Assuming that you really are still sleeping in your bed at night, there's no reason that the bed bugs would seek you out during the day on the couch.

Remember that an individual bed bug doesn't need to feed more often than once every few days. Of course, if there's more than one bed bug in the home (and there usually are), chances are good that one of your bugs needs to feed every day.

Evolutionarily, the bugs have developed behaviors designed to maximize their chances for survival. For bed bugs, that seems to be the following:

Feed when your food is most deeply asleep and, therefore, least likely to notice and squish you

Hide like a very hidey thing the rest of the time.

Stick close to the food source to minimize the chances of getting killed.

All of this means that absent other factors, a bed bug is going to harbor very close to the place that your body flops over into a prone or supine position. The bugs will only come out when you are most deeply asleep. The bugs will feed and then scurry back to their hidey hole to wait until they need to feed again.

I like to envision them as a bit like me when I'm consumed by a new video game. When I've got a new game, I park on the couch and play for hours.

I get up to pee and to eat. But until I get through that first play through, I don't go far. I arrange things so I don't need to.

It is true that as bed bug numbers increase, a few bugs will hie off from the harborage. Entomologists are studying that to see why; there are theories that the bugs are females fleeing the reproductive process (I'd flee anything that is called traumatic insemination too) or that once the environment yields more bugs than can be comfortably supported, a few bugs take off looking for greener pastures.

Using any technique that may cause the bugs to emit alarm pheromones (like glue traps or sticky tape or mounds of DE or chemicals that repel bed bugs) may break this pattern too.

But if there's food right where they live, and they can get the food, they aren't generally going to risk going out when the big, giant food source is up and moving around and making noise and generally looking far more intimidating.

As long as you're not sleeping on the couch or hanging out there in the wee hours of the morning that you're usually alseep during, I don't see any increased risk of the bed bugs spreading--unless you're doing other things that would make them likely to spread.

Hope that helps!