Tips For Prepping Your Home For A Bed Bug Treatment
Posted on: 19 September 2016
If bed bugs have infested your home, be prepared to do a lot of work to get rid of them, even if you hire a professional pest control company to provide treatment. That's because you'll need to prep your home to get the best results, and you may need multiple treatments. The first step is to get an inspection. The pest control professional will determine which rooms in your home are infested and the extent of the problem. Then you'll be instructed on how to prepare for the treatment. Here are some things you may have to do.
Get Rid Of Clutter
You'll need to remove as much clutter as possible. Throw out what you can. This is a good opportunity to get rid of old magazines, books, pillows, and clothes you no longer wear. If you can throw out some things, there will be fewer belongings you'll have to treat for bed bugs. Be sure to bag the items before you remove them from the room or you may spread bed bugs through the house on your way to the trash can outdoors.
Bag Your Belongings
The next step is to bag the belongings you want to keep. This includes items on your shelves, stuffed animals, and all of your clothing. Keep the clothing you'll want to wear in the next few weeks easy to access so you aren't constantly digging through sacks to find what you need. You'll eventually need to launder all the belongings you can in hot water or run them through a hot dryer and then return them to new sealed bags until you're sure the threat of bed bugs is over.
Prep Your Room
With all the clutter gone and the rest of your belongings bagged up and placed in another room, your bedroom should be mostly bare and easy to clean. You'll want to use a vacuum cleaner to suck up as many bugs as you can. Vacuum the floor and use the crevice tool to suck bugs out of crevices, baseboards, and other tight places. Prop your mattress and bed springs against the wall and vacuum them and the bed frame thoroughly. Finally, pull furniture away from the walls so the exterminator can walk through the room freely and apply the chosen treatment whether it is dry ice or pesticides.
Wait For Follow Up Treatments
Depending on the type of treatment your home receives, you may be able to enter the room right away, or you may need to stay outside for a few hours. However, when you're allowed back inside, you don't want to immediately restore your belongings. You may be scheduled for a second treatment in a few weeks. Bed bug eggs could hatch out and infest your home during that time. Save yourself the effort of bagging everything up a second time by waiting and making sure the bugs are totally gone before you start putting your clothes in the closet and books on your shelves. Just be sure you inspect each item before it is returned in case some bugs survived in the sacks.
Hopefully, if you've done a good job of prepping your home and are very careful when bagging and unbagging your belongings, your bed bug treatment will be successful. You'll know for sure when a couple of months have passed and you're free from itchy welts and blood spots on your bedding. For more information, contact local professionals like Arab Termite and Pest Control.
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