What are Bedbugs? How Do I Know I have Bedbugs?

Bedbugs are not necessarily always waiting in the bed for a human host. They can be nearby and are drawn by the heat source and the CO² exhaled by the human. They puncture the skin using two tube-like appendages. One tube injects saliva (containing an anesthetic and anticoagulant) to the site. The second tube withdraws the blood from the host. Because of the anesthetic, bites may not be detected for several minutes or even hours. Individuals who are not allergic to the bedbugs' saliva may show bite reactions. Bite patterns in a cluster or row may indicate that the bed bug was interrupted during feeding.

Bedbugs can live for up to 18 months without feeding on blood. In the absence of a host, they can go into a stage of dormancy. A female bedbug can lay up to 500 eggs in her lifetime. Because the eggs are as small as two grains of salt, they are very difficult to detect by the human eye. Scent-detection canines, such as Bella, can detect the presence of eggs in a room by their unique odor.
While bedbug infestation was a major problem prior to the mid-Twentieth Century¹, the advent of pesticides reduced the problem greatly thereafter. However, there has been a resurgence of bed bugs. There are two theories for this: the problem is growing dramatically due to the prevalence of human International travel OR bedbugs are also hosting on birds and bats which are facilitating their spread.