Got Bed Bugs? Bedbugger Forums » Tools/ideas for fighting bed bugs
my couch solution!
(4 posts)-
junior member
Joined: Oct '07
Posts: 106
Posted 2 years ago
Sat Oct 20 2007 23:20:02
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Hi all --
posted a few days ago having an anxiety attack about my new jerk "roommates."
Unfortunately despite my best efforts, tears and anxiety do not kill bedbugs. Too bad!
I have a PCO coming in on Monday to do my first treatment. My mother drove down to Denver today to help me prepare -- ended up throwing out a ton of stuff, she brought her steamer and we steamed pretty much everything, caulked cracks, vacuumed, pried off electrical covers, etc etc. Did not discover any more bug evidence except one dead bug which was floating in my mineral spirits cup underneath one of my bed posts.
Which leads me to my amazing wonderful couch solution!
I use my couch quite a bit and cannot afford a replacement. We inspected my couch and found no signs of bugs . . . never been bitten while on the couch . . . we went ahead and steamed and laundered it anyway. I am going to assume (for the time being) that it is BB free. And to keep it that way, I decided to employ the mineral spirits solution for this too. Problem initially was that my couch has wooden legs -- not the greatest thing to be sitting in a bug cup of solvent.
So during a trip to the hardware store (via the liquor store, gotta keep sane while cleaning somehow! haha) for duct tape we were wandering the aisles and thought up the awesome plan. I bought some plastic plumbing couplings. They are large and round and sturdy enough to support the weight of my couch, even with me laying on it. We also bought four large round plant saucer trays, the ones made of heavy-duty vinyl. You can guess where I'm going. Wooden legs on the couplings, couplings in the saucers, mineral spirits in the saucers.
I am feeling much better about things now. Didn't do anything with my armchair because I so rarely sit on it and frankly it wouldn't break my heart to throw it away (it saw me through my college years so yeah, you can guess what sort of shape it's in!)
Anyway maybe this is a total "duh" solution to a lot of you but I was pretty proud and pleased. Keep out of my couch you little jerks!
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Stamps,
I don't want to rain on your solution, but here's the problem: "isolating" a couch or bed will only work if the couch or bed is 100% bed bug free.With beds, the mattress can be encased but the rest of the bed must be bed bug free. A sofa would work on the same principle.
Why? Look, if you have mineral oil cups, the bed bugs won't crawl onto the sofa (good). But if they are already IN the sofa, they will stay there and bite when you sit down. They will live and breed (as the adult females do after every blood meal). Their eggs will hatch and live on the sofa.
In other words, you may be keeping them alive.
It IS possible to treat sofas, but it has to be done aggressively and will take time and multiple treatments with pesticides. In some cases, it will not work.
If you do not isolate your sofa, bed bugs may come out of it, cross poison (which is likely on the floors and elsewhere) and die. If you trap them in, they may live.
This is true, as I said, of bed frames too. If it is not guaranteed bed bug free (ie brand new, or at least a metal frame that has been immersed), I would not isolate it as you describe.
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Margaret
newbite
Joined: Oct '07
Posts: 16
Posted 2 years ago
Sun Oct 21 2007 10:39:14
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This is more of a follow-up question than an answer. My husband and I are renting a furnished apt in St Petersburg, Russia. The bed we've been sleeping on--infested--is a sofa bed. It's the kind that unfolds flat, so that the seat and back of the sofa are the mattresses that you sleep on.
Our landlady has sprayed the sofa bed with a Russian Raid-type solution (anti-bedbug) and is going to call a professional exterminator of some kind--for us and for the neighbors, who brought the bugs.
I just don't know if it's possible to be sure that the bugs are out of the sofa bed-it seems to take weeks.
My husband doesn't react (or doesn't get bitten?) at all, but I have huge swelling and blisters one centimeter in diameter on my legs and arms--so far my face and neck aren't so bad. I'm living at the landlady's house (trying to be careful about my belongings) because my reaction is so severe. The last biting session (when I found the bugs) even made my throat swell, so it's pretty scary.
Should we insist that she get rid of the sofa and buy us a bed? I am just in despair thinking about the solutions--you all in English-speaking countries have it (relatively) easy--I don't even know how to say DE in Russian (chemically that is), and don't know if XL zip-locks, etc, are even available. Maybe they still use DDT here, I don't know. At any rate, I think the first month of my Fulbright is going to be devoted to fighting bedbugs, not furthering international mutual understanding.... -
Sorry Margaret, it sounds like a nightmare.
The plus to getting rid of the sofa is that it is hard to treat AND if your husband continues to be bitten, they will keep breeding and spreading. He may be bitten but not allergic so may not notice. They won't simply ignore him if you are not there.
The bad news is that getting rid of the sofa may not get rid of bed bugs (since they are likely in the structure and in other furniture too). It would be safer if the new mattress were encased, and I would have someone send you a good encasement, if that's the plan.
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