It’s the last thing that you want to hear from someone in your own home: “I think we might have bed bugs.” If your home has fallen prey to bed bugs, you may be wondering what to do to get rid of them as quickly as possible. It helps to know what they eat, and what kind of environment sets them up to flourish.

Their Favorite Food

What do bed bugs really crave? In short—you! Bed bugs prefer human blood over any other type of mammal blood that they can get their pinchers in. That they prefer human hosts is exactly what has led to them garnering their generic name of bed bugs. They prefer eating at night, usually an hour before dawn, which makes sense of why bites may look so fresh and red when you first wake up.

They’ll feed on whatever blood they can find, not just humans. Pets can be targets of bed bugs just as much as humans, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that having a dog or cat makes your home more susceptible to them by default. This is because, again, they prefer to linger with human hosts.

Can They Eat Anything Besides Blood?

Unfortunately, the answer to this question is a strong “no.” Bed bugs are simply biologically suited to consume blood and only blood to survive. A feature of adult bed bugs that keeps them alive during dry spells where they can’t feed as frequently, is that adult bed bugs can stay alive for months without feeding. Feeding is also a necessary part of the reproductive process for bed bugs, so their numbers will stagnate until they can find a fresh host to regularly feed off of.

How Bed Bugs Eat

They find body warmth to be like a magnet, drawing them in to feed. They will penetrate the skin with hollow tubes, through which they inject a small amount of saliva that contains an anesthetic that numbs the area of the sensation of pain. The injected saliva also contains a coagulant—which helps prevent blood clotting while they feed, allowing them to draw out blood in the first place. They’ll feed for up to five minutes, until they can’t hold any more blood.

They’ll typically feed every 5-10 days, depending on when they next get hungry again. However, they can continue to survive for up to 18 months without feeding—so just leaving an infested space for a few weeks doesn’t solve the problem. While this might be a tempting thing to test, tackling an infestation head-on with professional treatment is really the only option.

The Bed Bug Life Cycle and Why It Matters

Bed bugs are similar to butterflies, in that they start out as an egg, hatch into a nymph, and go through a series of molting cycles as they grow and mature into full adulthood. There’s a key relationship between whether or not a bed bug develops into its next phase of life, and consuming human blood. We are necessary in order for these little pests to grow and mature into adults that can reproduce. This means that the best way to stop an infestation from spreading is by not putting it off, but tackling it head-on as soon as possible.

Warm temperatures and tight spaces are their dream habitat. That’s why they like beds, furniture, travel gear, clothing, and even electronics like old TV sets and home stereos to live inside of. These spaces stay cozy and serve as convenient feeding spaces.

No, Your House Isn’t Dirty

Bed bugs don’t actually congregate in households or spaces that would be conventionally considered dirty or untidy. While clusters of clothes on a floor space can certainly serve as viable homes for bed bugs, it all goes back to the source—they are attracted by a human host. That can be any host, no matter how dirty or how clean they are. They’ll travel in a person’s clothes that they’re wearing, or in a back that they’re carrying with them while they travel. It really has everything to do with the fact that we are humans, and the little vampires want to suck our blood. Your house isn’t too dirty or too clean for them to show up, because they won’t discriminate.

So, What Can You Do About It?

The solution to a bed bug infestation is simple. It’s time to call a professional pest control specialist. Unless you go straight to the source, and ensure that the bed bugs are killed thoroughly, they will continue to linger and grow in numbers. Their ability to wait long periods between meals, and their heartiness of adult bed bugs, make them a particularly difficult pest to get rid of. That’s why professional treatment is necessary. Through a combination of heat and chemical treatments, the right pest control specialist will be able to help you find complete freedom from these nighttime pests.

How to Get Started

There are different stages of bed bug treatment that, together, help provide full relief from these unwanted visitors. Physically vacuuming up bed bugs and their molted shells is one method that can be used in highly infested spaces, and this is a good way to collect any eggs in that area as well. Washing your sheets and any infected clothing is a good choice too, and if you’re worried about spreading bed bugs from one space to another plastic wrap can go a long way. Don’t forget to check in your box spring whenever you’re inspecting for hiding places!

Types of Treatment Available

Heat treatment and chemical treatment are the two main methods for getting rid of bed bugs. Heat treatment is effective because bed bugs cannot live in temperatures that are too high—which means that space heaters and other methods can be used to make the bed bugs either flee the space because of the heat, or will cause them to die. Chemical treatment works the most effectively in neutralizing any pest threat. If you’re concerned about unleashing chemicals in your home, you should consult with a pest control expert about different types of chemical treatment that are available and how they will affect your home.

If you are someone that you know is suffering from a bed bug infestation that seems like it will never end, it may be time to contact a professional pest control expert to get the help you need.