News

By Michael Russell

VP of Sales

Action Termite and Pest Control

  The resurgence of bed bugs over the last 3 years has been widely reported and many property managers are affected by this infestation.

Unhappy tenants, the loss of income and the expenditure of Bed Bug Control are on the rise for Property Managers.

When researching the most effective way to combat bed bugs, it is evident that everyone seems to have a different approach. Some companies use dogs for inspections, some don’t, some companies use steam or cryonite, some don’t. This inconsistency leaves a property manager to make the right choice. But what is the right choice when it comes to curtailing the rise of infestation?

The most effective bed bug control programs always seem to have several things in common; the use of bed bug dogs to properly detect an infestation, the application of steam to ensure the killing of the bed bug’s egg stage, the proper application of chemicals in a variety of forms (fogging, dusting, and crack and crevice,) and perhaps the most important step is the preparations made by tenants prior to treatment.

The effective use of bed bug dogs.  

There is no absolute method in the detection of Bed Bugs to date. The closest to an absolute can be found in the arrival of the bed bug inspection dog. At a proven detection accuracy rate of 98%, Bed Bug Dogs can inspect an average one bedroom apartment in about 2 minutes.

Human technicians are about 35% accurate and would take over an hour to do a thorough inspection of the same one bedroom unit. Bed Bug Dogs can sweep around 25 to 30 units in an hour, as opposed to the human inspector of one per hour.

Now imagine you have 100 units in an apartment complex, the bed bug dog can inspect the entire complex in about 4 hours. A proper human inspection would take about 100 hours. Bed bug dog inspections are about $300 per hour and the average human inspector is about $100 per hour. In this scenario of 100 units to be inspected, the average cost for a bed bug dog inspection would be $1,200 with a 98% accuracy rate, where as, a human inspector price would be $10,000 with only a 35% accuracy rate.

Bed Bug Dogs help save property managers money on the treatment process.

No longer does a property manager have to treat units adjacent, above and below a unit that has been found to have an infestation. That means for every one unit that has bed bugs, property managers were paying for 4 additional treatments and exposing more tenants to treatments needlessly. By using a bed bug dog for inspection, only units that have been found to have bed bugs actually has to be treated.

Bed Bug Dogs have been trained by the best trainers to be hard workers and friends to man. Nevertheless, a truly effective Bed Bug Dog must be trained daily, kept active and healthy, and be constantly aware of his/her objectives. Bed Bug Dogs are not pets, they are an invaluable part of a bed bug control strategy, and as such are treated with the love and respect they deserve. Amazingly, they seem unerringly eager to do their jobs, finding an obvious sense of gratification in what they do, all the while needing only the praise and love of the handlers to fuel them forward.

Steam vs. Cryonite 
Currently, there is no effective chemical that is being manufactured for pest control companies to kill the egg stage of the bed bug. That means if your bed bug program does not include either steam or cryonite (a freezing method) you may be wasting your money, as the remaining bed bug eggs are sure to hatch and re-infest your building.

Pest Control Companies with the greatest track record of success utilize steam treatments or a cryonite treatment to complement their chemical treatments. Moreover, in the past few years, there has been a distinct division between companies that use steam versus those that use cryonite.

Either method, when generating a direct contact hit against the bed bug, will kill all stages of the insect including the egg stage, however, it has been shown that cryonite is not nearly as effective as steam. A recent study has shown that placing a live bed bug under a sheet of ordinary copy paper and spraying the paper with cryonite will not kill the bed bug.

However, doing the same experiment with steam, shows different results in that the bed bug can not survive a steam treatment even without having a direct hit.

How to Prepare For Treatment 

To maximize the effectiveness of a Bed Bug Treatment, it is vitally important for tenants receiving treatment to prepare in advance. Each tenant should be required to complete the following before any bed bug control treatment proceeds:

1. REDUCE CLUTTER. Now is the time to get rid of things that have been lying about for years, items the tenants have always intended to get rid of but haven’t. Make sure tenants bag and seal all items they are removing.
This will help seal and protect from bugs or eggs dropping throughout the apartment complex.

2. All beds must be stripped. All linens must be removed and washed on the hottest setting and dried on high heat. If you are taking your clothing/linens to a laundry-mat for cleaning, make sure to use new bags after you launder. Do not use the same bag you took to the laundry unless it has been washed/dried on high heat.

3. All clothing should follow the same procedure as linens. Once taken from a hot dryer, seal clothes in contractor type bags or large Ziploc bags until further notice. A sealable Rubbermaid container may also make life a little easier for access to clean clothing throughout the process. All linens and clothing should remain sealed until after the final bed bug control treatment. If clothing is already clean, just putting the items through a cycle in a high heat dryer will be fine.
(It’s the heat from the dryer that will kill bed bugs. Don’t over stuff the dryer.)

4. All dresser drawers, night stands, vanity and armoire drawers must be emptied or cleared for treatment. All items from said drawers should remain in the same room if possible. Personal items can be placed in bags or boxes until after the first treatment is complete. All closets must be emptied for crack and crevice treatments.

5. Dry Clean/Delicates. Dry cleaning items works, however most dry clean only items can go through a dryer cycle on high heat as long as the items were not wet. For all questionable items, we strongly recommend using a Packtite unit. www.packtite.com

6. Vacuum each room including the edges of the baseboard molding. A crevice tool is the best option while vacuuming. This is a very important step for the effectiveness of your treatment. Be sure to vacuum under beds and furniture. After each time you vacuum, remove the bag and place it in a sealed trash bag for disposal outside the home.

If using a canister vacuum, empty the debris into the trash for immediate disposal outdoors and wash canister in very hot water.
7. All open food must be removed or placed inside of a refrigerator. Place all drinking vessels, plates and eating utensils in a kitchen cabinet.

After Treatment Procedures 

1. Tenant should open any windows (weather permitting) to allow ventilation

2. Wipe down any surfaces such as counters, kitchen tables, and bed side tables.

3. All furniture should be vacuumed thoroughly.

4. All floors and along baseboards should be vacuumed thoroughly.

5. Cover your mattress and box spring with approved bed bug encasement covers.

What should tenants do with their pets? 
Dogs, Cats, Hamsters, etc: Animals must be removed from apartment during a bed bug control treatment and may return at designated safe return time.
The following preparations are only needed when a fogging treatment is done:

Fish: Remove 4 inches of water level, turn off pump/filter and seal top with plastic and tape.

Birds and Snakes: Birds and snakes are highly sensitive to airborne agents and it is strongly recommended that they are taken out of the area of any treatments and not to return for 24 hours. Because of building ventilation, both vents in your apt should be covered while treatment is taking place and a damp towel should be placed by front door.

This article also appeared in the following:

Rich Wilbert searches for bed bugs with his dog, Sara. Dogs are trained to sniff along baseboards, beds and furniture for the pheromones, the faint chemical odor that the insects emit to signal one another. (Michael Nagle / For The Times)

COLUMN ONE
By Bob Drogin

A Dogged Pursuit of Bedbugs

There’s high demand for dogs that are trained to track down the tiny, bloodsucking parasites, which have invaded cities in the last four years.

Reporting from Asbury Park, N.J. – Sara pulled on her leash, sniffing up one side of a cluttered bedroom and snuffling down the other. The black Labrador retriever suddenly sat beside an armchair.

Rich Wilbert, her handler, flipped the chair over and poked at the stuffing and seams. He spotted pin-sized drops of human blood — clear signs of an infestation of bed bugs in the small apartment.

“Good girl, Sara,” Wilbert said. He fed her a few treats from a bag as a co-worker made a note to treat the room with insecticide. Sara went back to searching for Cimex lectularius, as she does six days a week.

A working dog’s life is not easy. Some canines gain glory by sniffing out bombs, drugs or land mines, but most do less glamorous labor. Beagles hunt home-munching termites, terriers track toxic fumes from Chinese drywall, and collies chase Canada geese off golf courses.

Bed bugs are the latest dirty job. Largely eradicated in the United States after World War II, the tiny, bloodsucking parasites have invaded city after city in the last four years, leaving painful skin welts and pricey pest control bills from Boston to San Francisco.

One result: Many pest control companies — especially those that use bed bug detection dogs — are riding high despite the economic recession.

They typically charge $500 to $1,000 to treat a small apartment or office. That buys a trained dog to detect the reddish-brown vermin, heavy applications of sprayed steam and chemicals to kill the insects and their eggs, and a follow-up visit with the dog to make certain the nasty nocturnal varmints are really gone.

Bed bugs hide during the day in wall cracks, behind light switches, or in other dark places. But the dogs sniff along baseboards, beds and furniture for the pheromones, the faint chemical odor that the insects emit to signal one another, and then alert the handler of an enemy invasion.

At Action Termite and Pest Control, based in Toms River, N.J., general manager John Russell said his business has grown by 30% this year thanks to Sara, Rex and Cassie, his three dogs. He is adding to his 46-member staff and plans to buy a fourth dog.

“The phone has been ringing off the hook,” he said. “We used to get maybe one or two calls a year. Now we get 10 to 15 a day.”

Among the recent jobs: an $80,000 contract to eradicate bed bugs from four apartment blocks owned by the Atlantic City Housing Authority. His dogs also sniffed their way through two office towers in mid-Manhattan and a luxury hotel in Philadelphia.

How man’s best friend can help him evict his nastiest bedmate

by Pamela Paul

Dog Bites Bug

“You see this?” says John Russell of New Jersey’s Action Termite & Pest Control, pointing into an overstuffed Manhattan closet where one of his dogs, a black Lab named Sara, has indicated a problem. “Clutter! That’s why bedbugs are so hard to find.” The apartment’s tenant, who has lived in his one-bedroom for 34 years, hovers nearby. When Sara noses one of the many jackets within, the tenant grabs it. “I’ll just throw it out,” he says, ushering the garment into the hallway.

Sara isn’t one of Peruyero’s dogs, but a graduate of a competing outfit, the Florida Canine Academy, which claims to have been the first to enter the bedbug business, and also certifies teams to detect bombs, drugs, money, weapons, termites, and arson. Florida Canine’s trainees, selected for their work ethic, drive, and desire to please, are taught to gesture with their nose, because, “dogs who give the paw,” the owner, Bill Whitstine, says scornfully, “can scratch furniture or end up spreading the bugs around.”

Read More at www.theatlantic.com

►Schedule a Service or Inspection

THREE QUESTIONS”Getting bugs is his business

Sunday, August 10, 2008
John Russell makes a living from bugs and rodents.

Russell, 43, is general manager of Action Termite and Pest Control in Toms River, a business that has been around since 1971.

Russell, a former computer repair technician decided to return to his father’s business in 1986 after realizing that corporate America wasn’t what he wanted.

Russell talked to The Star-Ledger about the family business and a worst assignment ever.

What are some preventive tips you can give about pest control?
Mice can fit through openings quarter of an inch. Always seal up openings around the outside of the home including door sweeps, pipe openings and make sure garage doors are tightly closed.

Termites: Store all excess building materials and firewood away from the house, wood is a source of food. Fix water leaks in the home, termites also need water. And get a yearly inspection.

Roaches: Use containerized roach baits. Wash kitchen cabinets with warm water, boric acid and baking soda and don’t leave unwashed dishes in the sink.

How do you deal with customers who have bed bugs?

Bed bugs infest only a small proportion of residences, but they should be suspected if residents complain of bites that occurred while sleeping.

When a customer calls in with a bed bug problem, the following steps are used.
We use a canine team to pinpoint all infested areas. Dogs work much faster using their nose than a technician pulling a room apart and checking all possible hiding spaces. We then treat the entire residence

We then use a steam treatment, a safe non-chemical application, which will destroy all egg capsules and any nymphs that might have hatched from eggs after the first treatment.

We also ask the homeowner to install bed bug covers to the mattresses and box springs and vacuum at least every other day to all areas treated. This includes mattresses, floors, furniture, moldings to remove all carcasses and eggs from the room.

Another sweep by the canine is done to ensure the area is clean and a final treatment applied.

Share your “nightmare” job since you’ve been in business?

The nastiest job I had to encounter was a severe maggot and fly infestation, as well as odor control in an apartment. This job was in early August in 1988 or 1989. One of the residents committed suicide. Unfortunately, no family member had checked on him for about three weeks after the incident.

We were called in by the complex management office. We arrived about 20 minutes after the coroner removed the body. There were thousands of flies and just as many maggots.

The decomposition was so bad that the body had burned an impression of the entire body on the carpet. I had to go back three times with three different technicians, because each one of them couldn’t handle the smell.

I will never forget that experience and hope never to encounter something like that again.

— Cynthia Parker

http://www.nj.com/business/ledger/index.ssf?/base/business-10/1218342939223290.xml&coll=1

Biz Buzz: Don’t let the bedbugs bite

Friday, July 18, 2008
Start throwing around terms like “host” and “bloodsucker” and a couple of things come to mind. Politicians, sure, but that’s just too easy.
Hookworms, leeches, Pacific lamprey. All cuddle-challenged creatures in their own way, but still nothing you’d likely encounter in your bedroom at 3 a.m.

That leaves bedbugs, those wingless insects that have scared countless generations of children. If you suspect a problem, the Harvard School of Public Health recommends carefully examining the nooks and crannies of sleeping areas, keeping a nose out for a coriander-like odor that may be present in heavy infestations.

Or you can send Sarah and Rex into the place. The two black Labrador retrievers spend their days working for Action Termite and Pest Control of Toms River, sniffing around for bedbugs.

The former shelter dogs were given more than 800 hours of training in Florida to track the elusive bedbug. The company said Sarah and Rex are more than 90 percent accurate and can pinpoint infestations.
Nighty night.
— Greg Saitz
http://www.nj.com/business/ledger/index.ssf?/base/business-9/1216355859319820.xml&coll=1

“You would go to a hotel after someone left that had bedbugs. You would put your clothing into the drawers and dressers and not realizing it then you take your clothes with you when you leave; go home and then spread it to the residential area.”
It takes a lot of effort to get rid of them. Russell and his team bring in bug sniffing dogs to determine where they are; once that happens the intensive treatment begins:

“We have to treat every nook and cranny: picture frames, moldings, electrical outlets. We have to pull the carpet up. The second treatment is actually steam.”

Steam will kill the eggs that haven’t hatched yet. Bedbugs leave tiny blood stains on mattresses and sheets, so you can look for those. And Russell says when you check into a hotel pull the sheets off the bed and check the mattress seams and the headboards.

Source: http://www.kyw1060.com/pages/2585530.php

KYW on Your Health- (Subscribe)
Goodnight, Don’t Let the Bedbugs Bite
KYW’s Michelle Durham spoke to John Russell, general manager of Action Termite and Pest Control about how you get bedbugs and what it takes to get rid of them. (10:06)

Source: http://www.kyw1060.com/

 Posted: Saturday, 12 July 2008 10:39AM

Goodnight, Don’t Let the Bedbugs Biteby KYW’s Michelle Durham

It’s a problem that many people don’t know they have or if they do, they don’t want to talk about it; bedbugs. And once you have them, it takes a lot of effort to get rid of them.

General Manager of Action Termite and Pest Control John Russell explains how you get bedbugs in the first place:

Bedbugs are making a comeback

By JASON NARK
Philadelphia Daily News
narkj@phillynews.com
856-779-3231

When a bedbug is siphoning your blood, it usually goes to the bathroom in the wound.

That’s just one of the many horrors that accompany infestations, which have become increasingly common in hotel rooms, cruise ships, houses, dormitories and even airplanes in recent years.

All but eradicated in the 1950s, bedbugs have made quite the comeback, hitchhiking their way across the world in luggage.

And exterminators say no one can sleep tight at night.

Bedbugs have “definitely become a problem again,” said John Russell, general manager of Action Termite & Pest Control, in Toms River, N.J.

And “they don’t care whether you’re rich or poor,” he said.

Last year, the Tropicana Casino and Resort in Atlantic City was reported to have bedbugs in the hotel before its gaming license was revoked.

Russell’s company is treating hotels in New York and Atlantic City for bedbugs as well as an 11-story building in Philadelphia.

To help, Mike Russell, the company’s vice president of marketing, says it employs two bug-sniffing dogs to root out bedbugs – and they’re in high demand.

“We’re getting at least 20 bedbug calls a week,” he said.

John Russell said bedbugs are classic hitchhikers, finding humans from the carbon dioxide we exhale and hopping off into our beds, where they feed and breed at night. One female can lay up to 500 eggs.

Sometimes, bedbugs can even be transferred by furniture stores that pick up old mattresses and carry them in delivery vans alongside new beds, John Russell said.

The flat brown bugs can usually be seen underneath or in the seams of mattresses or nesting behind headboards during the day.

Tiny blood stains on mattresses and sheets are also a sign that you’ve got bugs that are feasting.

Bedbugs inject a numbing agent so their bite can’t be felt.

John Russell says they haven’t been found to transmit diseases.

Still, they’re not a bug you can live with. *

http://www.philly.com/philly/news/24305934.html

Humans losing war against bedbugs

9:03 AM, Dec. 4, 2011

http://www.app.com/

For Action Termite and Pest Control, located in Toms River and Red Bank, bedbugs have doubled the size of the business in less than 10 years, according to Michael Russell, vice president of sales and marketing.

When bedbugs finally reached the Jersey Shore in the mid-2000s, Russell said, Action was the first company to begin using bedbug-sniffing dogs to find infestations. Today, the company has six dogs and has grown from 24 employees to 48. Its market has expanded from Ocean County to includeNew York and Philadelphia.

“We probably didn’t get a (bedbug) call for 30 years,” Russell said. “Today, it’s 50 percent of the business.”

Action first uses dogs to sniff out bedbugs wherever they hide. Russell says the dogs are 98 percent effective, compared with 35 percent for a visual human inspection. They then treat the infested areas with a one-two punch of steam heat and chemicals.

Why is so much attention paid to the tiny bedbug? Why have these insects, barely visible to the naked eye, demanded so much human energy during the past decade? Why more than mice, mosquitoes or cockroaches?

It’s because they live where we live and, more importantly, feed on our flesh.

“Tolerance for bedbugs versus roaches, for example, is zero,” Wang said, “because of the pain and discomfort they cause.” Bedbugs can leave their victims covered with hundreds of tiny, painful bites — often inflicted while the victim sleeps.

For complete article:  http://www.app.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2011312040018