About a decade ago, Arkansas was receiving the highest number of bed bug-related calls every week. This was quite a concern because this number beat calls related to flight rates and lost luggage around the peak travel months.
Many years have passed, and a lot of things have changed. But unfortunately, Arkansas is still facing a bed bug problem. Partly because the population doesn’t understand how to best deal with bed bugs, their cause, life cycle, and who to reach out to for help.
But you are in luck. This piece compiles everything you need to know about bed bugs in Arkansas.
But first,
Arkansas Quick Stats Overview
Arkansas is a thriving state that has brought forth prominent persons in the country, including Bill Clinton, the 42nd president of the U.S., and John Grisham, the world-renowned author.
Arkansas measures 53,179 sq. miles and got its name from the early Spanish and French explorers in the region. However, over time, it has earned nicknames, including ‘The Land of Opportunity’, and ‘The Natural State.’
The later stuck because of its beautiful landscape, including forested hills, lakes, mountains, farms, and fertile plains.
Given its landscape, it’s easy to see why it thrives on agriculture, paper, and timber industries. Besides this, Arkansas prides itself as the only state in the US where diamonds are discovered and actively mined.
Unfortunately, it’s not all a bed of roses. As mentioned, Arkansas has a bed bug problem. In 2013, a jury awarded a family in Arkansas a $546,000 payout for the experience they endured while in a bedbug-infested hotel room. This is believed to be the highest bedbug payout in the U.S.
Arkansas Population
During the 2010 census, Arkansas had a population of 2,915,918 and was the 32nd largest U.S. state by population. However, the population has since grown to over 3 million.
By 2016, Arkansas was ranked 29 as the fastest-growing state.
How Many Counties are in Arkansas?
Arkansas has a whopping 75 counties with Pulaski and Calhoun County being the most and least populated counties respectively.
How Many Cities and Towns are in Arkansas?
Arkansas has 502 cities and towns. The most populated city is Little Rock (the capital city), and the least populated is Scott.
Even though Arkansas is known for agriculture and diamond mining, it also receives a significant number of tourists every year.
Some of the go-to cities include;
- Hot Springs
- Little Rock
- Bentonville
- Fayetteville
- Conway
- Fort Smith
- River Mountain
- Johnson
As you travel to these cities and towns and book hotels, observe a strict bed bug prevention routine. When you check into a hotel, inspect the bed, and closet for signs of bed bugs. Even if the hotel is highly rated and clean, don’t take chances. Bed bugs are great hitchhikers, and you can never be too careful.
Top Sports Teams in Arkansas
Sports are a core part of Arkansas culture. Arkansans love participating in both professional and college sports events. The major college sports team is the Arkansas Razorbacks or the Hogs. All sports teams at the University of Arkansas go by this name.
Arkansas Bed Bug Laws
Unfortunately, the state doesn’t protect Arkansas tenants from bed bug infestation. Also, the warranty of habitability doesn’t apply as it does in other states.
Because of this warranty, in other states, properties should be checked for habitability before leasing. But in Arkansas, this is not a thing, and therefore landlords aren’t held responsible for any infestation that might have been growing before you leased the space.
Without legal protection, your best bet is to move out or to cater to the cost of bed bug extermination yourself.
Bed Bug Services
To conquer an enemy, you first need to learn their ways. In the case of bed bugs, it means learning how they spread, how to detect them, their life cycle, habitat, myths and misconceptions surrounding their presence, and who to call to handle the situation efficiently without throwing your life off balance.
What Are Bed Bugs?
Bed bugs are parasites that have an affinity for human blood. They are tiny but detectable with the naked eye. In the mid-20th century, bed bugs were under control until the early years of the 21st century.
An adult bed bug is reddish-brown and has an oval and flat shape. It is about the size of an apple seed and doesn’t have wings. They go through a simple metamorphosis, which means that they don’t have the pupal stage. On the contrary, they resemble an adult throughout their five nymphal stages. However, their color and size don’t match that of an adult bed bug.
A nymph is between 1.3 millimeters and 4.5 millimeters in length. At their smallest, they are like the letters on a U.S dime and at their biggest, a little smaller than a sesame seed. Before they feed, they are white, almost translucent in color. It’s this feature that makes them almost invisible to the naked eye.
If you’ve never seen a bed bug, you can confuse them with other parasites such as carpet beetles, fleas, ticks, cockroach nymphs, and booklice. Due to this resemblance, Arkansans rely on welts from bed bug bites to distinguish between these parasites. Unfortunately, this isn’t a reliable method, either. The sure-fire way of telling them apart is by their movement, tendencies, and appearance.
Bed Bug Habitat
From their name, you can deduce that bed bugs love living on or close to a bed. In some cases, bed bugs hide in furniture, small cracks, and crevices in a room, under carpets, picture frames, wallpaper, electrical switch plates, and any dark place close to a human blood meal.
Given their preferred meal, they aren’t limited to one dwelling place. They can thrive in homes, hospitals, hotels, colleges, schools, office buildings, movie theatres, public transportation, and retail stores. Yes, even seven-star hotels and high-end clothing outlets are susceptible to bed bug infestations.
The fact that they are such great hitchhikers helps them travel and occupy any place humans frequent or settle in. How do they survive in low traffic habitats? Well, bed bugs can live for several months without a single meal. They slow down their metabolism and survive the drought for up to 12 months.
Favorable Bed Bug Conditions
Bed bugs are highly resilient animals and can survive in some insane temperatures. But even then, they have limitations. Generally, room temperatures are perfect. However, temperatures higher than 118-degrees Fahrenheit can kill bed bug eggs, nymphs, and adult bed bugs if kept constant for 90 minutes (for eggs) and 20 minutes (for adults).
Temperatures below 0 degrees Fahrenheit also kills bed bugs.
Bed Bug Myths
Now let’s demystify some of the myths and misconceptions about bed bugs.
- Bed bugs are only active at night – this is false. Bed bugs are not nocturnal. The only reason they feed at night is that you are resting and lying still for prolonged periods at night. If you changed up your routine, and bed bugs, you’d start noticing bed bugs biting you even during the day.
- Bed bugs infest dirty spaces – false. Any space can get infested by bed bugs; even five-star hotels and high-end retail shops. Bed bugs do not respect your position in society or how fancy and clean your space is. All that matters is that there is a blood meal close by. However, reducing the clutter in your space will decrease the hiding spaces and make an infestation harder to grow.
- You cannot see bed bugs with the naked eye – yes, bed bugs are tiny, but they aren’t microscopic. They are big enough to detect with your naked eye. However, when dealing with nymphs, using a magnifying glass will go a long way.
- If I wake up with bite marks it’s a sure sign of a bed bug infestation – it could mean you have a bed bug problem, but it’s not a sure sign. Other insects and parasites like mosquitoes and fleas also bite. Only the presence of bed bug eggs, a nymph, or an adult bed bug, can confirm an infestation.
- If you have a bed bug problem, get rid of all infested furniture and clothing – with our help, you can still salvage these items. You can launder clothing and pack them in plastic bags to avoid re-infestation. For the furniture, you can treat them with acceptable industry treatments. If no treatment suits your furniture, then you can discard it (but only after a professional consultation).
- Bed bugs spread diseases – this is false. There’s no scientific backing to prove this. However, some people react to bed bug bites. Also, excessive scratching from bed bug bites irritation can cause secondary infections.
- Bed bugs fly – bed bugs are wingless parasites. They can’t fly or jump like fleas. But they are great ‘nomads’ and can crawl over long distances to get to their blood meal.
- Moving to another room will starve bed bugs to death – you are in for a rude shock. Bed bugs are resilient parasites. Their physiology allows them to survive up to 12 months of starvation.
Signs of a Bed Bug Infestation
A mature infestation will be evident for about 3 to 6 months. Below are tell-tale signs of a bed bug infestation:
- Blood stains on mattress seams and your bedding
- Squished bed bugs on pillowcases and your bedsheets
- Sighting nymphs or adult bed bugs late at night or early morning
- Itchy bites that appear in clusters or lines on your arms, back or legs
- Dark specs of droppings in crevices
Why Do You Have a Bed Bug Problem?
As insane as this might sound, bed bugs like you. But primarily for food and their survival. Also, they are great hitchhikers. You might find them on airplanes, hotels, conference halls, and any other place people congregate. This means that you might pick them up at an airport on your way to or from Arkansas.
Always remember that bed bugs are not a result of sanitation or housekeeping problems – they just infest to survive.
How Can We Help?
We are here to save your day and restore your peace of mind and enjoyment of your home. We offer a wide range of treatment options categorized into two;
- Residential bed bug treatment – we come into your home and handle the bed bug infestation in a matter of hours.
- Commercial bed bug treatment – we cater to school, offices, hotels, movie theatres, and any other commercial premise. We do our best to work around your official working hours to minimize disruptions. However, the sooner you find time to solve the problem, the sooner you go back to offering clients quality service.
Our Treatment Process
Success is not only about the treatment method, but also about the process. We’d love for you to have a great experience working with us and never to be infested again. To ensure this, we go through a three-step process.
- Assessment – once you call us, we will schedule a visit and inspect your home for bed bugs. We’d hate it for you to pay for bed bug treatment without having the problem in the first place. We seek out bed bugs in their hiding spots and map out areas of concern.
- Implementation – once we ascertain you have a problem and we establish the areas that need more attention, our specialist will recommend the best treatment for your space. These treatments are based on efficiency, your budget, and your space.
- Monitoring – we’ve mentioned this a couple of times – bed bugs are resilient. To ensure that none of them survives to raise another round of infestation from the ashes, we send a specialist after two weeks for a follow-up.
Treatment methods
The treatment methods we employ are tested and proven. We can use single treatments or a combination of both depending on the severity of the infestation and how fast you’d want to achieve results.
The methods we employ include:
- Heat remediation – we use specialized treatments to rise and maintain room temperatures for hours without damaging building structures.
- Steam – like heat remediation, steam seeps into cracks and crevices to kill adult bed bugs and their eggs.
- Fumigation – we use chemicals or environmentally friendly treatments to get the work done.
Why Hire Us?
With so many bed bug treatment services in Arkansas, why should you prefer us? Well, not to blow our own trumpet but;
- We present you with an experienced team
- We use high tech equipment to ensure safety and efficiency in our treatments
- Treatments are done on your schedule
- Fast response
- We offer free inspections
If you are in Arkansas and believe you have a bed bug problem, call us at 888-681-5908. We’ll schedule a free inspection and guide you on the best treatment process.
