Successfully fighting an outbreak of bed bugs requires two back-to-back steps. First, locating where the bugs are hiding is essential. Whether you employ bug-sniffing dogs or other methods, you want to make sure you do a thorough job of inspecting your infected room as well as the adjoining rooms. If you don’t find all the areas the critters are hiding, exterminating won’t solve your problem. You will simply kill part of the population and allow the other living population to move in later.

The second step is the actual extermination. According to experts, bug-treatment should be done immediately after the search is completed, or at the very least within 48 hours. Otherwise, the bugs could migrate to other areas in the home or office and you’ll miss exterminating in their new hiding place.

An unfortunate example of this occurred recently with an office used by NYC Transit in Long Island City. Several months after they exterminated, the bugs were back biting employees. Apparently, they waited a week after discovering the hiding places of the bed bugs. Only then did they begin extermination. Of course, by that time, it was highly likely that the bugs had colonized new areas in the office which were missed in the original treatment.

Not only do you need to treat the areas where bed bugs are found, but commonly you should additionally treat the adjoining rooms and rooms that are above and below. Bed bugs can travel under drywall and through ventilation ducts. Once they are entrenched it really takes careful inspection and vigilance in treatment to find all the hiding places.

If you have a bed bug infestation, make sure to hire bed bug experts who know how to get the job done right!