N.B. pest control companies bitten by bedbug resurgence

Pest control companies in New Brunswick are reporting a rise in the number of bedbug complaints, as the tiny, blood-sucking insects appear to be making a comeback.

Greg Ricker, the owner of Excel Pest Control in Fredericton, said in the past five years complaints of bedbugs have increased, especiallyin hotels and in apartment buildings.

'The hotels and motels are having a terrible problem.' Greg Ricker, owner of Excel Pest Control

"About five to six [or] seven years ago we might have gotten one call, maybe on bedbugs every three months possibly," he said on Thursday.

"Now, at this point, we're receiving generally two calls per week, I guess would be an average right now in the Fredericton, Saint John area."

The reddish-brown insects, which are about six to 10 millimetres long, were all but wiped out after the Second World War.

Ricker said the calls are coming from homeowners and businesses but he warned there are certain places that are feeing the bugs' resurgent bite the hardest.

"The hotels and motels are having a terrible problem," he said.

Maurice Bourque, the owner of Action Pest Control in Moncton, said he's seen some serious infestations in his 27 years in the pest control business.

"In the real bad infestation I seen them in clothing in dressers, behind baseboards," Bourque said.

"There was one apartment, it was in the telephone. The telephone was broken and there was a whole bunch of them."

Bedbugs travelling from hotels to homes

The reason for the rise in bedbugs, both Bourque and Ricker say, is that people are travelling more and the pests are hitching a ride home in suitcases.

They recommend people bring a flashlight when they stay at hotels and use it to check around headboards, a popular place for the bedbugs that are about the size of an apple seed.

When at a motel "some people, what they do now is they tear off all the bed sheets, they look on the seam, along the seam of the bed and there's little black dots alongside the seam," Bourque said.

"That is the bedbugs laying eggs and the feces. You can find them around that area or even around the headboard."

The National Bed Bug Summit hosted by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in Washingtonthis week also discussed the rapid rise of bedbug infestations south of the border.