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Relieved Mom in Virginia - Batbugs
(3 posts)-
kkm
newbite
Joined: Aug '10
Posts: 9offline
Posted 2 years ago
Sun Dec 26 2010 8:38:53
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I wrote in back in August as "Freaked out mom in VA"....just wanted to share my story. Thankfully, it turned out we had BATbugs. There were bats nesting in the roof of our kitchen bay window. No bats in the house, and this roof was sealed off and not part of our main attic roof.
I had been hearing noises coming from that window for 1-2 months, asked a couple pest/bat people, no one put it together. I assumed it was mice or birds. Then in the late summer we started finding bugs in the kitchen and the bathroom upstairs (which is directly above this window and the kitchen). Two pest control companies identified the bugs as bedbugs but said futher investigation was warranted since we found NOTHING on our beds! One company had me ready to sign a contract for $4000 to completely treat our house for bedbugs asap.
Given where we found bugs and our particular circumstances, this did not feel right to me. But I was desperate and very upset. Mostly I could not imagine packing up a 4,000 s.f. house to treat for bedbugs!! I called Connor's Pest in northern Virginia out of desperation (since I had heard about them here). Lo and behold, they did offer service to Richmond (which I didn't expect) and had a guy coming out to Richmond the next day.
Dog came, found no bugs. The technician immediately suspected batbugs when he heard my story. Sure enough, we looked outside the window and it was full of bat droppings! He gave us some climb-up interceptors (those little plate things) to put under our beds just in case and went off to get the bug samples tested. They were of course, batbugs and nothing was ever found on our beds.
We had the bats removed, treated for the bugs, etc. It was not a big deal and with the precautions we took I do not believe anyone was bitten.
I felt like enough time had passed where I could safely write this and move on to the new year with a fresh start! I'm eternally grateful to the people at Connor's who really knew their stuff. And I'm also grateful for all the advice I got on this forum.
Just wanted to share my experience! Now if we ever do get bedbugs (heaven forbid) I at least know what to do and who to call for help.
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oldtimer
Joined: May '07
Posts: 1,969offline
Posted 2 years ago
Sun Dec 26 2010 12:27:08
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Really glad to hear that an alert K9 handler identified the presence of Bat Bugs.
It is not uncommon for Bat Bugs to be misidentified as Bed Bugs... They look remarkably similar without magnification.
Here is a link for a fact sheet and identification guide.
http://ohioline.osu.edu/hyg-fact/2000/2105a.html -
loubugs
old timer
Joined: Mar '07
Posts: 1,639offline
Posted 2 years ago
Mon Dec 27 2010 6:32:03
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The dogs will alert to bat bugs, because here in NY both bugs are Cimex species. I suspect that K9 searching the bedroom and rest of the home didn't reveal cimicids of any kind. I had one case where the bugs were in the bedroom (having crawled down from the attic) as opposed to finding bugs in the kitchen due to a bat infestation. The PCO suspected bat bugs since these insects looked a bit different from the bed bug that he had commonly encountered. A look in the attic cleared any doubts (as did sending me the samples).
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