Clark Pest Control's Blog

Sacramento Bed Bugs - The Bed Bugs are here!

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Sacramento may not know it, but the bed bugs are here

The shape of a flax seed and the color of blood, they hide in cracks and crevices, crawling out for a blood meal in the dark of night.

They're well known in San Francisco, where the health department has its own bedbug regulations. And in New York, where a bedbug attack early this month forced temporary shutdowns at two Abercrombie & Fitch stores.

In Sacramento, the quarter-inch parasites have yet to surface in the mainstream. Yet they're still there, hiding.

"It's on the rise. There have been more calls about it because people are getting infestations in their rental units," said Tom Curl, county code enforcement officer.

The National management Association reported a 71 percent rise in U.S. infestations since 2001. And a University of Kentucky study found that 91 percent of pest professionals had noted a bedbug increase. "It's a problem of almost epidemic proportions being reported in each of the 50 states," said spokeswoman Missy Henriksen.

Unlike San Francisco, officials in Sacramento don't track bedbug cases.

"I don't think Sacramento city or county does a good job to make sure it's easy for a person to report a bedbug problem," said Bill Gaither, director of Pest Control Operators of California.

The county's health officer, Dr. Glennah Trochet, said reporting bedbugs isn't required. "No one is responsible for keeping tabs on it because bedbugs don't cause diseases," she said.

Property owners in the city can face initial fines of $1,400 for failing to eradicate pests such as cockroaches. But they get a pass on bedbugs, which are considered a civil problem between landlords and tenants, said code enforcement officer Bill Hutcheon.

Curl said the county is taking small steps to deal with bedbugs. "We recently received direction that we do respond to bedbugs. Even though it's not a vector, it's a nuisance and it's going to spread to other rental units." Curl said the department can charge property owners with improper maintenance fees if bedbugs go untreated.

"It's not as reported here, but it's just as big a problem as in San Francisco," said Martyn Hopper of Pest Control Operators.

Chuck Ehmann, the department head of Clark Pest Control, said that two years ago he received a maximum of 10 bedbug calls a year. Today, he gets that many calls a month.

"We didn't know if this was going to be a little visit from the past or a new reality. They're not going away," said Jim Steed, owner of Neighborly Pest Management. Bedbug treatments account for a fraction of Steed's business, but the issue is high on the psychological radar, he said.

The mental impact sneaks up in the form of insomnia, phantom sensations and paranoia that the creatures are lodged in personal belongings. Most bedbugs are found in or near beds, according to the University of California's Pest Notes. The rest hide in upholstered furniture, bedroom cabinets, baseboards, wallpaper and carpets.

"Professionals who treat them say they are the single most difficult pest to eradicate -- worse than termites, ants and rodents," said Henriksen. The problem lies in their ability to hide in cracks as thin as a credit card.

Professionals have traditionally used chemical Insecticides but are researching less toxic and more effective methods such as heating a living space to about 140 degrees for a few hours and setting up traps. But bedbugs, which can lay up to 500 eggs in a four-month lifetime, are notorious repeat offenders, sometimes forcing pest control officers to apply several treatments to a single unit. Costs can swing from a couple of hundred dollars to a couple of thousand. As part of the treatment, residents must remove clothing and bedding from their living quarters.

Pest control providers say infestations are usually no one's fault. Clean and clutter-free living spaces help abate infestation, but as the New York Times Magazine reported in an article about the spread of bedbugs in an affluent New York neighborhood, bedbugs are equal-opportunity pests.

"You'd think that cheaper motels would be bigger targets but that's not the case," said Hopper.

The bedbug can increase landlord-tenant stress. The Rental Housing Association responded to the crisis by creating a bedbug addendum to its standard lease agreement last year. "It provides a layer of protection for the owner or manager," said senior deputy director Cory Koehler. "The resident shouldn't be able to come into a rental unit that is pristine and not follow good housekeeping standards."

Advocates with Legal Aid of Northern California said bedbug addendums have grown in popularity, but they maintain that the pests are an owner's responsibility. "Even with an addendum, you have to prove that it's the tenant's fault," said Martha Valles, a housing paralegal, and the parasite's elusive behavior can make that difficult.

The annoying insect that can leave itchy red welts, cause psychological damage, and trigger a slew of economic and legal complications has the potential to become lethal, some experts warn.

"We're lucky they haven't been inside of disease cycles yet," said Dr. Vernard Lewis, a University of California, Berkeley, entomologist. "Can the situation of bedbugs turn for the worst? Of course it can because evolution happens."

www.sacbee.com/. Copyright (c) 2010, The Sacramento Bee, Calif.

Bedbugs Close Sexy Hollister Store in Soho

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Source: http://gawker.com

If you've ever walked down Broadway just south of Houston Street, you know the Hollister. There are always shirtless lifeguard-type boys outside, urging you in? It's quite effective! Not so effective? Bedbugs, which are what the store is currently battling.

The Wall Street Journal tells us (gotta pay for that article) and Gothamist confirms that the downtown branch of the teen-centric Abercrombie & Fitch spin-off (it's the Joey to Abercrombie's Friends) has had an infestation for some time, and that the store is not currently closed due to construction, as it had at one point been telling disappointed shoppers. Gothamist paints a more grim picture than the Hollister spokesman quoted in the WSJ. The site spoke to an anonymous employee who told them this gross tale:

On Tuesday the 29th, an employee found that she had been bitten, and also found a live bedbug and an exoskeleton on her borrowed Hollister outfit. All of the employees were forced to continue working even though more and more bugs were being discovered.

Multiple employees were covered in bites. Hollister was more concerned about losing money than the health and safety of their hundreds of employees and thousands of customers. If they were concerned in the least, the store would have been shut down the moment the first bugs were discovered. Just today they closed the store down, but who knows how many employees and customers were exposed to the outbreak in the past three weeks, only jeopardizing the rest if the stores in the area as bedbugs spread like wildfire.

Guhhh. The employee then goes on to point out how dark the store is, which means things were able to creep and crawl and burrow and bite unnoticed for god knows how long.

Apparently they've now posted shirtless models outside (run! go see 'em!) to tell folks to turn back, making many would-be eager shoppers very sad. The WSJ spoke to some of these poor people:

On Wednesday, Sylvia Mak of Brooklyn saw the sign saying the store was closed and was confused.

She and her two daughters, ages 12 and 13, had planned a shopping spree. They'd wanted to spend $70, or more, on shirts.

"We're very disappointed," said Ms. Mak of the closing. Actually, lady? I think those bedbugs just did you a favor.

[Image via Flickr]

Send an email to Richard Lawson, the author of this post, at richardl@gawker.com.

BEDBUGS - Phoenix battles bedbugs in public housing

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by Sadie Jo Smokey 
The Arizona Republic

A shredded blue mattress and box spring leaning against a large trash container outside Pine Towers indicates that residents of the east Phoenix multifamily community are battling an infestation of blood-sucking insects.

Bedbugs are flat, reddish brown and smaller than an apple seed. They hide in mattresses, furniture and walls. They feed on sleeping humans at night.

Letters from city staff to Maricopa County Environmental Services indicate that in the past year, the city has battled recurrent bedbug infestations at Pine Towers, 2936 N. 36th St., as the pests spread from one apartment to another. Residents of the 133 public housing units cannot "refuse treatment due to the nature of the problem," city documents show.

Leona Godfrey, a 16-year Pine Towers resident, said she'd wake up with little red bites on her arms. Not an ant bite. Not a mosquito bite. Bedbugs.

"I had an infestation on the arm of my sofa," Godfrey said. "I don't know where they came from. We've never had a problem before."

Godfrey, who sometimes sleeps on her sofa, said preparing her home for the pest treatment was "really miserable," but the psychological effect of having the pest was worse.

"That's the real kicker, what it does to you," Godfrey said. "You mention bedbugs and people jump back. They don't want to be around you. I didn't want to sleep here. I didn't want to be here. I put everything in plastic bags on the patio."

The pest does not discriminate. Countywide, since Jan. 1, approximately 160 bedbug complaints were reported to the county's environmental services agency in apartment complexes, private residences, hotels, motels, nursing homes and assisted-living communities.

Of the city's 2,371 public housing apartments and homes, 28 cases of bedbugs were reported in the past year, said Brian Suggs, of the Phoenix Housing Department.

In January, the Arizona Multihousing Association, hosted a seminar on bedbugs. At a community meeting, Phoenix Councilman Tom Simplot, who is president of the association, told residents the pest has only recently reappeared in the state.

Simplot said city departments and responsible landlords are addressing the problem by responding to complaints and providing pamphlets about the insects in English and Spanish. City leaders are considering an ordinance regarding the disposal of bedbug-infested mattresses, furniture and bedding.

"If we're not proactive, bedbugs are going to be a bigger problem," Simplot said. "It's not just college kids that get furniture from the alley."

 http://www.azcentral.com/community/phoenix/articles/2010/07/05/20100705phoenix-housing-bed-bugs.html#ixzz0tCV3vn7y

Bedbugs bite homeless shelter

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By Catherine Pritchard
Staff writer

The Salvation Army's homeless shelter is battling a tiny pest that is causing big problems: bedbugs.

The Alexander Street shelter has been dealing with the bugs for "a good year now," said Jackie Godbold, director of public relations for the Salvation Army in Fayetteville.

"We keep them at bay and then, because of the nature of our business, it's very difficult to keep it under control," she said. "Some of our people are living under bridges."

The situation is made more difficult because the Salvation Army doesn't want to close the shelter for several days at a time to do a more thorough treatment, said Mary Webster, the shelter's case manager.

Click here to read the entire article

Ugh! Motel room bedbugs crash the party

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By Judy Benson

 

Published 11/24/2009 12:00 AM

Updated 11/24/2009 07:31 AM

 Woman, in town for relative's birthday, spends itchy night at Groton Super 8; health officials, exterminators get called in

Groton - This birthday celebration included some uninvited - and very much unwelcome - guests.

Last weekend, Nicole Main of Middleton, N.H., came to southeastern Connecticut with her sister-in-law and a friend to celebrate her sister-in-law's 21st birthday with a visit to Mohegan Sun. Afterward they drove to the Super 8 Motel in Groton to spend the night.

"I didn't sleep very well," Main said Monday. "I was itchy all night."

In the morning, she and her friends discovered why: bedbugs. They found them crawling across the sheets and in the crevices of the mattresses they had just slept on.

"I collected a few in a cup and brought them to the front desk," Main said.

Then she called the Ledge Light Health District, which sent an inspector to the motel. Main said she learned to identify bedbugs from training she had in a job she formerly held at a hotel. Neither she nor her friends found any visible marks from bedbug bites.

click here to read the entire article 

 

  

Bedbugs: Freeze 'em, bake 'em, get rid of them

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BY ABBOTT KOLOFF • GANNETT NEW JERSEY • NOVEMBER 22, 2009

MORRISTOWN — Mayor Donald Cresitello, in his waning days in office, says he's looking into ways to kill bedbugs infesting a Morristown Housing Authority building by either cooking them or freezing them. Cresitello said last week that two companies have contacted him about ways to eradicate bedbugs at 31 Early St., a 100-unit senior housing building operated by the housing authority.

He said one company, On Site Energy of Long Island, N.Y., proposes heating the inside of the building to 130 degrees for hours to melt the insects' protective skin. The other, Bell Environmental Services of Parsippany, would use dry ice to freeze the bugs and destroy their cellular structure.

Marion Sally, executive director of the Morristown Housing Authority, responded last week by saying Cresitello's characterization of the situation was "overblown," with just eight of 100 housing units affected. And while the mayor talked last week about alternative methods of killing bedbugs, she said he hadn't made those suggestions to her.

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Bedbugs make a comeback in a BIG way

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Bedbugs make a comeback

Posted: Nov 19, 2009 1:29 PM PST
Chris Proffitt/Eyewitness News

Indianapolis - The resurgence of an old pest is causing concern in Indiana and across the nation. The bedbug is back big time, and they can be found everywhere, including five star hotels and your own mattress.

Eyewitness News found an Indianapolis home infested with a problem that's become so severe that some are calling it not far from epidemic.

"They're here. They're here to stay. They're going to be transferred anywhere humans are," said Elia Levin, pest control company owner.

They are bedbugs. They are about the size of an apple seed and their populations are exploding across the country. Hiding in mattresses, bed sheets, couches and even luggage, they have a sole purpose.

"Ecologically, their role in life is that they are predators on mammals and blood feeders," said Prof. Tom Turpin, Purdue University etomologist.

Their prey includes humans, sleeping soundly while the bedbug, travelling through walls and electrical outlets, finds its prey and feeds, gorging on human blood and often leaving telltale bite marks on their victims.

The old saying, "sleep tight, don't let the bedbugs bite" had real meaning before World War Two. The insect was popularized in "Mean Old Bedbug Blues," a 1927 jazz recording by Bessie Smith.

After the war, insecticides came alone and wiped out the bedbug in North America until international travel reintroduced the population, now up by some estimates as much as 500 percent.

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Bedbug Pest Control - State wants help in fighting bedbugs

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Wednesday,  November 11, 2009 4:35 AM
By Doug Caruso THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

Faced with a growing invasion of bedbugs, Ohio has asked the federal government for permission to turn them back with a pesticide that is not labeled for use in homes.

"We are in dire straits, and we need help," said Matt Beal, assistant chief at the Ohio Department of Agriculture.

The department asked the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Oct.23 for an emergency exemption to allow the use of Propoxur in residences.

The insecticide is used in commercial buildings, on crops and in flea and tick collars for pets, Beal said.

More than a dozen other states are supporting the request.

Though there have been exemptions in the past to fight crop pests, it's the first time such an exemption has been requested for an indoor pesticide, he said.

The Environmental Working Group, which recently backed a call to remove Propoxur from pet collars, urged caution. It's best to reduce human exposure to such chemicals, said Leeann Brown, a spokeswoman for the nonprofit group based in Washington.

During the next two months or so, the EPA will have to weigh the risks of allowing more Propoxur to be used against the growing threat of bedbugs, Beal said.

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Firefighters fighting BedBugs

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After a recent visit from an exterminator declaring they were indeed infested with bed bugs the Wilmington Fire Station threw out mattresses, upholstered furniture and carpets, anything that might be housing the bed bugs.   And these little blood suckers cost more then a few drops of blood.  The total cost to the fire station was over $5000 between the loss of the furniture and the pest controller's bill of $800+.

ABC reported on the matter first.  Also citing a CDC saying bedbugs are up by 500% over the last few years.  Considering that bed bugs had been virtually eradicated from the US over 20 years ago, that number doesn't do the Bed Bug epidemic justice.

Fortunately doctors still have not found any serious health risks associated with bedbugs or the spread of disease through bedbugs.

Click here to read the entire article