Bedbugs

[snow2day]

We are coming from the west coast, and have heard that we need to be really careful re: bedbugs. Is this true? :confused: Does this include both hotel and cruise? We have never experienced them, and don't want to. Any tips would be helpful. TIA

[cb at sea]

Bedbugs can be anywhere....fortunately, we've never encountered them either on a ship or a hotel.

 

You can easily see if a bed is infested....check the seams of the mattress..that's where they like to hide.

Don't put your luggage on the bed...use a luggage stand or desk/tabletop to unpack...you don't want to risk getting bugs in your suitcase and taking them home!

Chances are super-good that there WILL NOT be bedbugs anywhere in your travels...it's really nothing you should stress about!

And, the West Coast has them, too!

[snow2day]

Yes the west coast has them too. But your information has helped me not stress over something. Thanks for taking the time to answer.

[firerunner]

We go on little mini vacations every few weeks or so and have stayed at a variety of hotels and never experienced bed bugs! However, that being said we ALWAYS check the bed, it is the first thing we do upon entering a room.

 

As the first person said they are easy to spot just check the mattress seams.

 

have fun!

[sjcruiser]

I'm starting to itch!!! Here we go again!!! lol

[5326jan]

bedbugs.... where's the "dislike" button?:eek: We haven't had the horror of finding them in our travels, but my son did catch head lice in a hotel in Philadelphia one time, many years ago. Yuck!!!! What a nightmare!

[grand isle joe]

......all I know about bed bugs is "don't let 'em bite".....;):D

[Putterdude]

I am happy to say we haven't experienced the critters in either hotels or on ships.

[Essiesmom]

bedbugs.... where's the "dislike" button?:eek: We haven't had the horror of finding them in our travels, but my son did catch head lice in a hotel in Philadelphia one time, many years ago. Yuck!!!! What a nightmare!

 

I caught two mice in my roomin a hotel in NYC many years ago...EM

[PrincessE]

What we do is leave the luggage in the hallway (at a hotel or on a cruise ship) and inspect the room. Look in corners and in and around mattress seams.

 

It's only after I've inspected the room for bed bugs do I bring in the luggage. The next thing I do is take out the Clorox wipes I've brought and I wipe down all the light switches, telephone, remote, door handles, etc.

 

My white blood cells have been known to crap out on me so I'm vigilant about keeping germs at bay, but I find it to just be good practice to bring things to my standards. It just makes me feel better.

[wieslaw]

What we do is leave the luggage in the hallway (at a hotel or on a cruise ship) and inspect the room. Look in corners and in and around mattress seams.

 

It's only after I've inspected the room for bed bugs do I bring in the luggage. The next thing I do is take out the Clorox wipes I've brought and I wipe down all the light switches, telephone, remote, door handles, etc.

 

My white blood cells have been known to crap out on me so I'm vigilant about keeping germs at bay, but I find it to just be good practice to bring things to my standards. It just makes me feel better.

 

 

Hi,

 

I do agree with you, but there is no 100% way of knowing if they ( nasty little bugs - I have seen them) are there or not.

Even your luggage - was it in your possession all the time ? or did it travel with hundreds of other pieces of luggage on the plane, or getting on the ship.

 

Inspecting the bed, the pillows is a good idea - chances are small that the bed bugs could be in your room ..... but you do not know that for sure. When inspecting your bed / pillows look for some indication of small dark or possibly redish spots. Look in the seams.

 

When we get back home from any trip, ...... now we leave the luggage in the garage and inspect it and every thing else vey carefully ....... we learned from experience.

 

Wes

[PrincessE]

Hi,

 

I do agree with you, but there is no 100% way of knowing if they ( nasty little bugs - I have seen them) are there or not.

Even your luggage - was it in your possession all the time ? or did it travel with hundreds of other pieces of luggage on the plane, or getting on the ship.

 

Inspecting the bed, the pillows is a good idea - chances are small that the bed bugs could be in your room ..... but you do not know that for sure. When inspecting your bed / pillows look for some indication of small dark or possibly redish spots. Look in the seams.

 

When we get back home from any trip, ...... now we leave the luggage in the garage and inspect it and every thing else vey carefully ....... we learned from experience.

 

Wes

 

We never check our luggage. We only take carry on luggage. We carry it onboard the flights and the ship.

[gingerboo]

Well, call me lazy, I guess:D! I never check mattresses in any hotel/motel/B&B, (and I've stayed in many, many over many years in many places in the world!) I never check my luggage when arriving home, never check mattresses in any cruise cabin I've stayed in, and live in a part of the US where there are insects I've never heard of. Mr. Exterminator visits my house yearly, but it's for termites, spiders, ants, cockroaches...yikes! I've never experienced bedbugs in the US, any cruise (and there have been a lot) or in any foreign country. Guess I'm just optimistic??

 

Just a tip - when coming back from beachy cruises or any beach, I take my duds to a laundromat after shaking them out, because I don't want sand in my washer/dryer.

[Sunebeach]

As a nurse I can tell you that not only 'dirty' people get bedbugs, and they often travel very easily in suitcases, any bag that gets set down somewhere where the bugs are. Our hospital recently had a patient that brought her critters with her in her wheelchair...it's hard to shut down an ER to allow exterminators to get in there. Our mattresses are nylon supposedly fluid proof, 'bug proof' but they can still get in the linens...so watch out.

I bought a mattress cover for my DD before she heads off to college this fall, 'cause the idea of those critters freaks me out! SO yes I check the room and bed, the toilet and shower etc to see how clean things are, I bring lysol or chlorox wipes, preferably cholorx [cause it kills roto virus, HIV and many more] and I wipe down things that I know no housekeeper has time to do between 4,000 people or more debarking...I have been known to leave a hotel on more than one occation when I found the room not to be clean at all! { at very nice chain hotels...}

[mitsugirly]

I also work at the hospital in the ER and I only work on weekends...keeping this in mind, there is AT LEAST 1 person every weekend that comes in with bedbugs. There's a nationwide outbreak right now with reports of places like the Howard Stern show, famous people and even the white house having them!!

 

My ex-supervisor was on the "bed bug committee" here in my state and we were taught everything about them. They are definitely something that you don't want to bring home with you. They are VERY hard to get rid of short of throwing everything out and moving.

 

Some interesting facts:

 

 

• There are at least 92 known species of bed bugs found throughout the world.
  
• Bedbugs are generally active only at night, with a peak attack period about an hour before dawn
  
• bedbugs can live for up to 18 months without feeding!!!!!
  
• Female bedbugs can lay up to five eggs in a day and 500 during a lifetime.
  
• The eggs hatch in one to two weeks, they must feed once, then become reproductively active only at maturity (5 weeks)
  
• Even exterminators can not guarantee when they exterminate that they can get rid of them and a honest one will tell you this and not give a warranty. Most charge about $1000 each visit to exterminate.
  

There is a bed bug registry that IF people have reported them, you may be able to find out if a place has them: http://bedbugregistry.com/

 

The top 10 states with infestation: http://www.thedailybeast.com/galleries/2010/08/24/america-s-10-most-bedbug-infested-cities.html Sadly to say, I live in Ohio...Cincinnati Ohio is #1, Columbus is #2 and Dayton, ohio is #9. 3 cities in my state are in the top 10 states! :eek: We stay up to this stuff NON-STOP and always on the look out! I bought mattress covers for all of our beds and check them at least weekly for any signs or bugs.

 

When we are on vacation, the first thing we do is check the beds when we walk in the room. I'm not taking any chances.

 

Prior to that...we check online sites to see if there has been a reporting of the place having bedbugs.

 

One good place to go is tripadvisor and look at the reviews on there. People WILL TELL you if they have encountered bugs there. When we were trying to decide on a hotel pre-cruise last year in South Beach Miami, we ran into TONS of hotel reviews that stated these places had bed bugs!!

 

Here is a picture of a "sign" that you can see on mattresses (or furniture) when you are staying some place:

 

 

If you do a search on these forums...typing in bedbugs...you WILL find people on here that have posted in the past that stated their room had bed bugs on any given ship. They have also stated that their room steward came in and would remove their mattress and bring them another. Mind you...this will NOT get rid of them!! They get into every crevice of the room...behind walls, outlets, carpet...you name it. So simply removing the mattress did not get rid of the problem. Hopefully those people did not bring any home with them!! I read one couple post that after seeing bed bugs on their cruise, when they got home in the middle of the night, they actually left their luggage outside, stripped all of their clothes off in the driveway before walking in. They wasn't going to risk anything!!! I don't blame them!

 

I know this is probably more information that you wanted or expected...just please take them seriously because it is a MAJOR problem these days and you don't want to risk it.

[wieslaw]

Hi,

 

thanks for your informative post and the links.

Unfortunately, looking there I found out that Detroit is on list right in the middle of the 10 - I reside about 20 miles from Detroit.

 

I have experienced - seeing them and being biten, in one of the hotels / cabins in a major US park. So after that, I did some checking on the internet, and you are so right, it is a big, big problem. I watched some TV programs about some houses that regardless what they ( owners, exterminators ) did - they ( the bugs) were still there.

 

I am just curious, how does the cruise ship handles that ? - new mattress does not fix the problem.

Do they fumigate the cabin? Does that kill the eggs ?

 

I Read that there is more and more dogs trained to sniff and find bed bugs. More and more hotels ( the expensive ones too) used the dogs - cheaper to clean one or two rooms than all of them.

 

Scary thought of bringing them home.

 

Wes