Are you concerned about bed bugs in your home? These small, blood-sucking bugs are famously difficult to find and much more difficult to eradicate, especially in heavily populated areas such as New York City. Despite their cunning, a watchful homeowner or apartment renter may be able to detect early signs of bed bugs. Bites, odors, and stains are often the first indicators of bed bugs for many people. You can detect a potential infestation before it becomes out of hand if you know what to look for. We’ll go through the 7 most frequent bed bug indications and how to check for them in this article.

Odors

Our sense of smell might sometimes be the first indication that anything is wrong. It could be an early symptom of bed bugs if you notice a strange, musty stench in your bedroom that doesn’t seem to come from an obvious source, such as a pile of dirty laundry.

When disturbed or threatened, bed bugs produce “alarm” pheromones. These pheromones produce odors that are slightly sweet or musty in nature. It smells like raspberries, coriander, cilantro, or almonds, according to those who have had firsthand smell with it.

The smell of pheromones is normally very weak, almost unnoticeable to the human nose. You have a slim probability of detecting the raspberry-like pheromone smell from bed bugs unless you’re a trained bed bug detector canine.

When a big number of bed bugs live together, the odors of their pheromones mingle with the smells of dead bed bugs, shed shell casings, and bed insect excrement. The consequence is an obnoxious, metallic smell that worsens as the infestation progresses.

Bites

Bed bugs are nocturnal insects that like to feast on our blood during the night. As a result, their bites are most common on skin that is exposed at night. The arms, hands, and legs are the most typical areas where victims get bitten.

However, pest management experts believe that bites alone are insufficient to detect a bed bug infestation. Because different people react to bed bug bites in various ways, there’s no definite method to tell them apart from other insect bites. In fact, 30% of people have no skin reactions to bed bug bites at all.

While everyone reacts differently to bed bug bites, the most common symptom is red, itchy pimples that emerge in small clusters. Bed bug bites appear in little clusters or lines of three bites, which some people refer to as the “breakfast, lunch, and dinner” pattern. Bed bug bites, on the other hand, might emerge as single bites or in random patterns.

Stains of blood

Even if we don’t see bed bugs when they’re feeding on us, they don’t always make it out alive. When a bed bug becomes engorged with blood, it transforms from a flat, seed-like shape to a round, inflated shape resembling a miniature football. Inadvertently crushing or squeezing a bed insect that has just finished eating if you move or adjust your body in your sleep.

While it normally doesn’t kill them, it can cause some of the blood they just ate to flow out, leaving a visible red or rust mark.

If you notice a bloodstain on your linens, clothes, or pillow, examine your body first to see if there is a cut or scab that could be the source of the stain. If there’s no other explanation, the bloodstain could have been left by a mischievous bed bug.

Fecal Marks

These little, dark dots seem like an ink dot from a pen or marker tip. They’re about 2 to 4 times the size of the period at the end of this sentence.

Bed bug droppings, which are made up of digested human blood, leave fecal stains. Because it contains iron, digested blood appears dark brown or black in color and emits a faint, rusty odor that contributes to the overall disagreeable odor of a bed bug infestation.

Feces from bed bugs can be found on sheets, pajamas, mattresses, headboards, box springs, walls, curtains, and a variety of other surfaces. They’re generally found in great numbers near bed insect hideouts and harborage regions.

Eggs

Pregnant female bed bugs lay one to seven eggs per day, which hatch in seven to ten days. Bed bug eggs are approximately 1 millimeter large, pearly white in color, and ovular in shape. They look like microscopic rice grains that have been reduced to the size of a pinhead.

Eggs are visible to the naked eye, but unless you know what you’re searching for, they can be tough to spot. Each egg has a hinged cover at the end from which the newly hatched beg bug emerges. A darkish eye mark can be visible on bed bug eggs that are more than 5 days old, but only under a microscope.

Bed bug eggs are more common at harborage places, similar to feces spots. Female bed bugs, on the other hand, tend to travel around when they’re pregnant, perhaps spreading the infestation to other rooms and apartments.

Casings for Shells

Shell casings are the translucent, hollow outlines of young bed bugs that are sometimes easier to spot than the bed bugs themselves. Mattress seams, upholstered furniture, and holes, fractures, and fissures in wooden furniture are all places where bed bugs can hatch and breed.

Bed bugs shed their exoskeleton multiple times during their 5 lifecycle phases before reaching adulthood. Molting occurs at every stage of the lifecycle, from the first instar nymph to the second instar, the third instar, the fourth instar, the fifth instar, and finally the adult form.

Alive Bed Bugs

The most obvious indicator, of course, is the presence of live bed bugs. Unless they need to eat or are pregnant females evading aggressive males, bed bugs don’t want to roam about. Bed bugs have a habit of finding a hiding location and sticking to it.

As a result, many people do not see live bed bugs until the infestation has progressed significantly. Live bed bugs are only easily spotted when their hiding spots are disrupted, such as while you’re packing for a move.

Finding a live bed bug in your home may seem like a dead giveaway, but it’s not always the case.

Bed bugs and other insects are frequently confused. Spider beetles, carpet beetles, and cockroach nymphs are the most common insects that people mistake for bed bugs, according to our experience.