Top Stories Milwaukee

Once almost extinct in the United States, the beg bug is making a big comeback in many states, including Wisconsin. Add to that an expected explosion in the mosquito population, thanks to a warm, wet spring in Southeastern Wisconsin, and the recent discovery of deer ticks in a Milwaukee County park, and it’s looking like this summer could be a buggy one indeed.

It’s hard to overstate how dramatic and sudden the reviled bed bug’s rise from obscurity has been. Phil Pellitteri, a veteran insect diagnostician with the UW-Extension, says that 20 years ago, he would receive just one or two bed bugs a year for identification. He carried them around to show his colleagues. They were rare and called for “show and tell,” he says. Nowadays, he receives 10-15 bed bugs a week for identification.

“It’s definitely become very prevalent,” he says. DDT, the powerful pesticide later banned by the federal government, largely wiped out the bugs in the 1930s. They became a rare and feared sight on American sheets. But due to an increase in travel to foreign countries where the bug still thrives and new pesticide-resistant strains, it’s no longer safe to turn out the lights.

“There’s been a huge resurgence,” says Randy Allen, manager of the Southeastern Wisconsin regional office for Wil-Kil, a pest control agency. Allen says he’s been in the business for 29 years and didn’t see a single case of bed bug infestation for the first 19. Their numbers increased gradually at first – then dramatically a couple years ago.

Today, at least half of the calls the office receives are questions about the bugs and requests to come kill them. Wil-Kil has bought a dog (“Max”) trained to sniff out the bugs and their eggs as he patrols hotels, apartments, dormitories and homes. The tiny blood-sucking insects have gone from anachronistic to commonplace, though public perception lags behind.

“People react with a level of angst. How could this happen to me? How could I pick these up? How could it happen to me?” Allen says. But Pellitteri says they’re akin to indoor mosquitoes – and safer, actually, because they’re incapable, it seems, of transmitting diseases such as West Nile virus, encephalitis or malaria to humans.

a bed bug

Enticed by body warmth and the carbon dioxide emitted when people exhale, bed bugs usually bide their time until making their move between 1 a.m. and 4 a.m. Then they climb onto their unsuspecting host, enjoy a “blood meal” and retire to the safety of a box spring, baseboard or some other haven. Bed bugs only feed every 5 to 10 days.

The challenge in ridding a home of bed bugs is thoroughness. Wil-Kil and other pest control companies recommend a treatment that involves heating the infested room to about 130 degrees for several hours to kill the bugs and their eggs. This method is more expensive than pesticide treatment but also more effective.

Luckily, many areas of the country have worse bed bug problems than Milwaukee. According to Pest Control Technology, a pest control industry trade journal, in 2009, “Incidence of bed bugs was highest in the Northeast region,” however, the pests “expanded significantly throughout the Midwest region.”

Meanwhile, mosquito populations have “gotten more than a little crazy,” according to Pellitteri. Summer Floodwater Mosquitoes, a variant that thrives with heavy and frequent rains, are taking off this year, he says. About a week ago, populations of them “hit the fan,” he adds.

The Floodwater Mosquitoes lay their eggs at the edges of temporary standing water, and frequent heavy rains cause their numbers to explode. Unlike most other species of mosquitoes, they will travel miles from where they hatch, though their direction is often dictated by wind paths, Pellitteri says. That means that under the right conditions, they can move from rural breeding grounds to more populated areas such as Milwaukee County.

bed bug on a penny

But the county can produce plenty of mosquitoes on its own, according to Sharon Morrisey, an agent at the Milwaukee County UW-Extension. “In a city, particularly, you have places where water can stand for extended periods,” she says, be they abandoned tires or up-turned garbage can lids.

Other pests crossing the rural-urban divide are deer ticks. Earlier this month, UW scientists identified an establish population of the ticks, the most common carrier of Lyme disease, in Doctor’s Park in Bayside. In a 30-minute sweep, they found one adult deer tick and several larvae, indicating ticks are breeding in the park.

“Deer tick populations have traditionally been a rural problem, but they’re starting to be found in various parks and green spaces within cities,” Morrisey says.

Worried you have bed bugs? Here’s Insect Diagnostician Phil Pellitteri’s guide to identifying the bugs – or their signs – which include leaving little brown or red spots on bedding or bed frames (feces and blood).

Post Footer automatically generated by Add Post Footer Plugin for wordpress.