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Community Corner

Bedbug Cases Creep up in Connecticut, But It's Too Soon to Call New Canaan a Hotspot

Town health officials received fewer than a half dozen bedbug calls last year.

They're tiny, thirsty and suckers for warm-blooded Connecticut residents, regardless of the season. 

But if you live in New Canaan, there's no reason to panic about bedbugs -- at least not yet. 

"We get four to six calls a year on bedbugs," Richard Werner, New Canaan Department of Health director, told Patch in response to questions about whether bedbugs were becoming more common in the municipality. "In my 40 years of experience in public health, bedbugs have always cropped up from time to time." 

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However, not all of those bedbug calls end up being for bed bugs, Werner told Patch. The oval-shaped, quarter-inch-long, seed-size creature -- which favors warm temperatures both indoors and outdoors -- is often mistaken for ticks and other skin crawlers. 

Additionally, their bites, which often appear as clusters of itchy red spots, could indicate mosquito or tick bites.  

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Werner said he attributes the bedbug phobia and panic to "the rapid movement of communications plus increased vigilance." 

That's not to say bed bugs aren't a growing problem in the state of Connecticut, and that municipalities like New Canaan -- while not as populated as cities like Hartford -- shouldn't be vigilant.

Gale Ridge, an entomologist and self-described "bedbug guru" who works for the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station in New Haven, told Patch bedbug calls make up the highest inquiry of all bug calls -- 13 percent -- in the CAES Insect Inquiry Office where local health departments like New Canaan's often send people. What's more, in 2009 and 2010 the number of incidents reported has reached its highest level yet, said Ridge.

"Those calls go to us to correctly identify the animals," Ridge said, noting the resurgence of bedbugs that began in the late 1990s is often attributed to the federal ban of certain residual toxic pesticides. "They're not just in New York. They're grossly under-reported [in Connecticut] because of social stigma." 

As a result of this growth, Ridge, along with state experts in law, science and health, formed a bedbug task force to address the growing problem. 

Though bedbugs are common "anywhere people aggregrate," they are more common in big cities like New Haven than they are in smaller cities, said Ridge. And if you're worrying about them latching onto your leg after a day in Manhattan, keep in mind that they don't necessarily favor a long Metro North ride. 

"The common bedbug will take a blood meal from two to eigt minutes," said Ridge. "It will leave the host, then, and find harborage then go back to the refuge. They don't like to be on people when peole are moving around. But occassionally, they will get trapped and they will cling." 

To learn more about bedbug signs, and what to do if you have them, visit the Conecticut Agricultural Experimentation's website. 

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