Bedbugs are back!

WNDU.com
South Bend, IN
By Nick McGurk

Pest control companies say the bloodsucking parasites were just about wiped out during the 1950’s – but bedbugs are coming back in force.
 
Pest control companies say the bloodsucking parasites were just about wiped out during the 1950’s – but bedbugs are coming back in force.

In the past year, Rose Pest Solutions in South Bend has experienced a 72 percent increase in bedbug business. Before 2002, the company hadn’t done any bedbug business, said Bob Seske with Rose Pest.

"They can hide, they can be in quite a few different places, behind outlets, behind moldings, behind picture frames, inside of electronics,” said Seske. “Any crack and crevice, they feed up to 100 feet from where they're harboring at,” he said.

Lorenzo Kibler knows what bedbugs can do, because about a month after moving into his South Bend apartment, the bugs appeared.

“They were biting me from head to toe!” he said on Wednesday. On his leg are bite marks.

“Every time they bite me they get blood. It don’t take ‘em long, and when they bite you you gonna stand straight up,” he said.

Inside Kibler’s apartment is what he says is proof: brown spots on curtains and sheets. He threw away most of his furniture and bags most of his clothing. Plastic covers the carpet of his living room.

"My apartment has been sprayed three times, and it's like whatever they are using is not working,” he said

Seske – who did not spray Kibler’s apartment, but was contacted by Newscenter 16 for information about bedbugs – says multiple treatments are often necessary because the bedbugs are so good at hiding.

As for the experience of dealing with bedbugs?

"It's a very emotional one, because it's personal, it happens when you're sleeping, usually it's just a frightening thing to go through,” he said.

Kibler understands all to well. He says he’s not the only one in his apartment complex with bed bug bites. And because he’s afraid of them coming out at night, he says he only sleeps during the day.

"Mental and emotional pain cause I can't sleep at night,” he said. “Gotta get rid of these bugs.”

Bedbugs don’t carry diseases like mosquitoes or ticks, but they do bite and take blood.


Story by:Nick McGurk • nick.mcgurk@wndu.com
Photo by: Jeff Swinger/The Enquirer