Bed bugCimex lectularius — identification, signs & control

• Adults 4–5 mm, oval and flat as a card when unfed; swollen, longer and darker red after feeding.
• Reddish-brown with no wings; they cannot fly or jump, only crawl.
• Short, broad head with four-segmented antennae and a piercing beak folded underneath.
• Nymphs are 1–4 mm and pale straw-coloured, turning bright red after a meal.
• Eggs are white, about 1 mm, and glued in clusters into seams and cracks.
• A sweet, musty smell in rooms with a heavy infestation.

Faecal spots

Clusters of small black dots on mattress seams, slats and headboards that smear like ink when wiped with a damp cloth.

Blood spots

Rust-red marks on sheets and pillowcases where a bug was crushed after feeding.

Cast skins

Pale, empty shells in seams and corners, shed as nymphs moult five times on the way to adulthood.

Eggs

White, grain-like, about 1 mm, glued into crevices close to where the bugs hide.

Live bugs

In mattress piping, bed frame joints, behind headboards, under loose wallpaper and inside sockets near the bed.

Bites

Itchy red bumps, often in a line or cluster on the arms, neck and shoulders; some people show no reaction at all.

Bed bugs feed on human blood, usually in the early hours while you sleep, taking five to ten minutes per meal before retreating to a hiding place within a couple of metres of the bed. Each nymph needs a blood meal before it can moult, and at warm room temperatures the step from egg to adult takes about six weeks. A female lays a few eggs a day. Adults can survive months without feeding, so a spare room left empty stays infested. They travel in luggage, second-hand beds and sofas, and move between flats through cavities and along wiring. They have nothing to do with how clean a home is.

Bed bugs are not known to pass disease to people. The harm is the bites, which can itch for days, and the lost sleep and anxiety that come with knowing something is feeding on you at night. Scratching can break the skin and lead to infection; see a GP or pharmacist if bites become hot, swollen or painful. Heavy infestations stain bedding and mattresses, and carrying an unwrapped mattress down a stairwell can spread bugs to the neighbours.

No law protects bed bugs, and there is no duty to report them. In rented homes, who deals with them depends on the tenancy and on how the bugs arrived, but councils can assess pests as a hazard under the Housing Health and Safety Rating System. In houses in multiple occupation, including student lets, bugs move between rooms, so the landlord is usually the one able to arrange treatment of the whole building.

Bed bugs are hard to clear on your own, and the NHS says as much. What you can do makes a treatment work better: wash bedding and clothes at 60°C, tumble dry on hot for at least 30 minutes, vacuum seams and empty the vacuum outside in a sealed bag, and fit zipped mattress encasements. Shop sprays and foggers tend to scatter bugs deeper into walls and furniture, and many UK bed bugs now resist common insecticides. Don't move to another room to sleep: the bugs follow you and the problem spreads.

We inspect the bed, surrounding furniture and nearby rooms to confirm bed bugs, rule out lookalikes such as bat bugs and carpet beetle larvae, and judge how far they have spread. Before treatment you get a preparation list covering what to wash, bag and move. We then treat seams, frames, skirting, sockets and other hiding places with insecticides approved for bed bugs, chosen with resistance in mind. Eggs can survive the first treatment, so a second visit about two weeks later targets newly hatched nymphs, and further visits are booked if live bugs are still found. Each visit is recorded in writing. Treatment starts from £90.

1. 1Check hotel beds on arrival: lift the sheet at a corner and look along the mattress seams and headboard with a phone torch.
2. 2Keep luggage on a rack or in the bath when travelling, not on the bed or floor.
3. 3Wash and hot-dry clothes as soon as you get home from a trip.
4. 4Inspect second-hand beds, sofas and bedside tables before they come into the house.
5. 5Use pale bedding and a mattress encasement so spots and bugs show up early.
6. 6Cut clutter around beds, where bugs hide and treatment is harder.

Bed bugs move with people, and Hertfordshire moves a lot of them: commuters on the Thameslink and West Coast lines into London, and travellers through Luton Airport on the county's edge. Shared houses in Hatfield around the University of Hertfordshire see beds, sofas and tenants change every academic year, which suits bed bugs. Hotels and short-stay lets near the M1, A1(M) and M25 are exposed for the same reason.

Areas we cover: St Albans · Harpenden · Hatfield · Welwyn Garden City · Watford · all areas