HABITS OF BEDBUGS 373 



ing southern Asia, Africa, the West Indies and South America. 

 The tropical bug (Fig. 165) differs from the common one only in 

 minor details, such as greater length of body hairs, darker color 

 and more elongate abdomen. It is less dependent on human 

 blood than its relative of temperate climates, and readily attacks 

 not only rats and mice but also bats and birds. Both species are 

 reddish brown in color, becoming deep red when gorged with 

 blood. 



Habits. — Bedbugs are normally night prowlers, and exhibit 

 a considerable degree of cleverness in hiding away in cracks and 

 crevices during the daytime. When hungry they will frequently 

 come forth in a lighted room at night, and have even been known 

 to feed in broad daylight. Favorite hiding places are in old- 

 fashioned wooden bedsteads, in the crevices between boards, 

 under wall paper, and other similar places, for which their fiat 

 bodies are eminently adapted. Like other animals which have 

 long associated with man, bedbugs have developed much cun- 

 ning in their ability to adapt themselves to his habits. Marlatt 

 says " the inherited experience of many centuries of companion- 

 ship with man, during which the bedbug has always found its 

 host an active enemy, has resulted in a knowledge of the habits 

 of the human animal and a facility of concealment, particularly 

 as evidenced by its abandoning beds and often going to distant 

 quarters for protection and hiding during daylight, which in- 

 dicate considerable apparent intelligence." Their ability to 

 gain access to sleepers at night is hardly less remarkable. Cases 

 are reported of bedbugs creeping along ceilings and dropping down 

 on beds in order to reach their hosts, but these may have been 

 accidental. 



The bedbug makes himself a great pest wherever he occurs 

 by the unsparing use of his piercing and sucking mouthparts. 

 The latter consist of four needle-like organs lying in the long, 

 jointed lower lip or beak, a pair of flattened sharp-pointed man- 

 dibles and a pair of slightly shorter maxillae with serrated edges. 

 The beak is grooved in such a way that the sides of the groove 

 almost close together, thus forming a protective sheath for the 

 stilettos inside. When about to indulge in a meal the beak is 

 bent back, and the piercing organs, gliding up and down past 

 each other, are sunk into the flesh of the victim (Fig. 166). A 

 strong sucking motion of the pharynx, into which a bit of sail- 



