Dec 23, 2011 – Starting A Family
QUESTION:
At what stage in life can a female bed bug start laying eggs and what size would she be?
ANSWER:
The basic answer is that the female bed bug cannot produce eggs until she has reached the adult stage, and she therefore is a full grown adult bed bug which will not grow any larger. Once insects reach the fertile adult stage, with few exceptions they do not molt any more and their growth is done.
The Common Bed Bug, which is our current nemesis, grows by Simple Metamorphosis. What hatches from the egg is a tiny bed bug that looks much like an adult bed bug, but smaller. Over the next 45 days or so the bed bug nymph will go through 5 instars, or stages, molting its exoskeleton each time to move onto the next and larger instar. The fifth instar nymph then molts and becomes the adult bed bug and no more molting or growth take place, other than the expansion that takes place when the bugs feed or when the female has developing eggs within her. A full grown bed bug typically is round and flattened and about 3/16 inch in diameter. This usually surprises homeowners when they see an example, as they seem to be expecting a much smaller insect.
A female bed bug then mates (in that violent manner) and can begin laying fertile eggs within 4 or 5 days of becoming that adult insect. She may deposit as many as 3 eggs each day, but more likely the average will be 5-7 eggs per week, with a total potential of up to 500 eggs over the next year or so. The eggs are usually deposited one at a time and they are glued to the surface the female chooses. This will usually be in a protected hole or crevice, such as behind the floor coving or along mattress seams, but eggs could be stuck to a wall out in the wide open spaces, and this is one of the greatest challenges we have. It is necessary to ensure that every last egg is killed when we do a bed bug treatment. To leave 2 fertile eggs behind means that potentially that infestation will start all over again once that male and female hatch from their eggs.
This also presents the challenge of finding all of the oviposition sites and dealing with them, and since bed bugs could hide within electronic equipment there easily could be viable eggs inside that computer, TV, or bedside clock as well. Thank goodness for Nuvan strips and heating as effective methods for killing all stages of bed bugs.
View past Ask Mr. Pest Control questions.
At what stage in life can a female bed bug start laying eggs and what size would she be?
ANSWER:
The basic answer is that the female bed bug cannot produce eggs until she has reached the adult stage, and she therefore is a full grown adult bed bug which will not grow any larger. Once insects reach the fertile adult stage, with few exceptions they do not molt any more and their growth is done.
The Common Bed Bug, which is our current nemesis, grows by Simple Metamorphosis. What hatches from the egg is a tiny bed bug that looks much like an adult bed bug, but smaller. Over the next 45 days or so the bed bug nymph will go through 5 instars, or stages, molting its exoskeleton each time to move onto the next and larger instar. The fifth instar nymph then molts and becomes the adult bed bug and no more molting or growth take place, other than the expansion that takes place when the bugs feed or when the female has developing eggs within her. A full grown bed bug typically is round and flattened and about 3/16 inch in diameter. This usually surprises homeowners when they see an example, as they seem to be expecting a much smaller insect.
A female bed bug then mates (in that violent manner) and can begin laying fertile eggs within 4 or 5 days of becoming that adult insect. She may deposit as many as 3 eggs each day, but more likely the average will be 5-7 eggs per week, with a total potential of up to 500 eggs over the next year or so. The eggs are usually deposited one at a time and they are glued to the surface the female chooses. This will usually be in a protected hole or crevice, such as behind the floor coving or along mattress seams, but eggs could be stuck to a wall out in the wide open spaces, and this is one of the greatest challenges we have. It is necessary to ensure that every last egg is killed when we do a bed bug treatment. To leave 2 fertile eggs behind means that potentially that infestation will start all over again once that male and female hatch from their eggs.
This also presents the challenge of finding all of the oviposition sites and dealing with them, and since bed bugs could hide within electronic equipment there easily could be viable eggs inside that computer, TV, or bedside clock as well. Thank goodness for Nuvan strips and heating as effective methods for killing all stages of bed bugs.
View past Ask Mr. Pest Control questions.
