Listen to this PodcastMore 60-Second Tech
-
Grifters Increase Their Internet Attacks
5/16/13 -
Bullies Turn Cyberspace Sour
5/11/13
Your worst fears about those insect bites on your leg have been confirmed—your home has bedbugs. Don’t panic. There are ways of dealing with these blood-sucking pests. Unfortunately, they do not include gadgets that promise to get rid of bed bugs using ultrasonic frequencies.
Little is known about bedbug sensitivity to sound. But Northern Arizona University researchers report that commercial devices producing ultrasound do not repel bedbugs. In lab tests, the insects proved quite indifferent to sonic assaults. Their report is in the Journal of Economic Entomology. [K. M. Yturralde and R. W. Hofstetter,
Efficacy of Commercially Available Ultrasonic Pest Repellent Devices to Affect Behavior of Bed Bugs (Hemiptera: Cimicidae)]
It’s also unproven whether similar ultrasonic devices sold to get rid of mosquitoes, cockroaches, fleas or ants work as advertised.
What is the best way to get rid of bedbugs? In a Scientific American article published earlier this year, University of Kentucky entomologist Kenneth Haynes noted that a combination of approaches—including heat treatment and a drying agent—works best.
Haynes recommends calling in trained professionals rather than taking on the problem yourself. So sleep tight. And, ya know…
—Larry Greenemeier
[The above text is a transcript of this podcast.]
See what we're tweeting about
2 Comments
Add CommentBed bugs can live for over a year, even trapped in a bag around the bed. They are pernicious, they can travel between apartments and homes, and can be picked up pretty much anywhere: buses, theaters, restaurants, even from someone's bag sitting next to yours. The can also live in many places other than the bed; headboards, pictures, nightstands, light switch plates, clothes . . . . . they can even fit in the cracks of floorboards and at the base of walls.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI've had them a few times. I use a powder around the edge of my matress, made from diatomacious earth and pyrethrins. The DE slices up their shells and they dehydrate, and pyrethrins paralyze insects. They have to crawl through it to feed (gross, but it's the best way to not only kill them, but prevent them from moving, too, as they would if the can't get to food.)
Horrid things; the only saving grace is that they do not carry any disease.
A product I buy labeled "Chemfree" which contains diatomaceous earth, states on the label to kill small ants, earwigs, silverfish, etc. and also bedbugs. Don't know about the bedbugs because I have not had to deal with them (yet) but works very well on everything else.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this