This will definitely be a question that will leave some of you scratching your heads … [:)]
One can’t turn to any form of media without reading, or hearing about the plague of bedbugs across our country. Bedbugs are being found in a wide array of locations such as high end men’s clothing stores and lady’s lingerie stores, rooms in hotels, apartments in multi-family dwellings, and even privately owned detached residences. The experts tells us that we should inspect things that are coming into our home, especially from others’ homes for bedbugs, for example inspect the screw heads in wooden furniture, be caution with electronics, etc. This is something that neither my wife nor I have ever, in all honesty given a great deal of thought to. However, this past weekend I aquired a marvelous array of gently used, new to me freight cars at an unbelievable deal from a fellow who was getting out of the hobby. As I was sitting rubbing my hands in glee as I sorted my new additions to my fleet, my wife asked if we should have considered the potential for introducing bedbugs into our home from these cars. We both stopped, looked at each other with a pang of worry, and then promplty forgot about it and carried on with what we had been doing.
But, it did get me wondering whether others in this hobby have considered this when buying used equipment through various online auctions, private sales, or swap meets. Is it a non-issue, or might it be something that could bite us on the backside if we are not careful?
I look forward to reading all of your thoughts on this pesky issue.
I would think that, unless the cars had been in an infested bedroom closet, perhaps on a small layout slid under a bed, or something with that kind of exposure to live humans, it won’t be a biggie. My understanding is that the little varmints don’t wander too far from dindins. That means where we park our warm odoriferous carcasses now and then. A layout and stacked storage bins aren’t going to sustain them.
If one is that concerned, I would suggest gently vacuum sealing the items in baggies (not too tight or you could damage details), maybe purging the interiors with nitrogen first. Wait two weeks, and you should be good to go.
The likelyhood of getting a boxcar full of bed bugs seems pretty remote. They need to feed on blood, but they can go up to a year without feeding. I was doing some reading, and cold doesn’t kill them, but heat above 113F does. A train room however, just isn’t a prime hangout for them, a bedroom is.
If you sleep with your trains, then all bets are off.[swg]
If 113 degrees will kill them, any which enter my train room are doomed! At least, they will be from mid-May to sometime in September (or later.)
OTOH, they might provide prey for my local arachnids - which have a habit of succumbing to starvation and dessication after spinning webs.
The first thing my wife does with anything fabric that comes in the door is subject it to a quick trip to the washer and dryer. About the only other things that come in are food and mail. I’m not very concerned about either. Bug-type critters of any variety seem to be rather scarce in our corner of the Dessicated Desert.
Well, I thought I´d seen and heard it all, but that´s a new one to me!
I think the risk of “importing” bed bugs from 2nd hand locos and rolling stock can be totally neglected. You´d see those critters crawling around when you un-box your treasures.
I would say DO NOT BRING ANY CARDBOARD BOXES inside! They can hide in there.
But the chances of them hitching a ride on a RR car might be slim, but and inspection of each car, especially box cars with movable doors might be in order. I don’t think the like to live the RR Hobo life. That would, as someone said. be too far away from dinner unless they were in the BR the past owners slept in.
Immediately with new or new-to-you clothing thing to do is throw in washer or very HOT dryer to kill any off that are hitching a ride there.
“The meek shall inherit the earth” be it bed bugs or viruses we can’t control any longer.
While I think the original post was a legitimate question and the correct answer is that those trains are not likely to be a source of bedbugs.
However this whole bedbug this is a classic example of the media “scare of the month”. If it isn’t bedbugs, it’s sharks or asteroids that are coming to get us. As a physician I have to deal with this media induced hysteria about some medical issue all this time. We do get scared easily these days but it is because the media (i.e. 24 hour news networks) fan the flames. - Nevin
Living in Bear country my concerns are for larger critters. I don’t even think about bed bugs unless the media goes on some rampage about them…and btw: Thanks Nevin, my sentiments exactly.
I agree, it reminds me of a recent photo making the rounds. I guy in Colorado (I think) was hunting alone and shot an elk. He set up his digital camera on time delay, and hurried back to get a shot of him holding the antlers. When he got home, the picture included a cougar to his left and less than 10 feet behind him. Aparently, the camera flash scared the big cat away. NOW THAT IS SCARY!!! [:O]
I have a vat of DDT in my train room, which I use to clean the track and as a replacement for Dull-Cote, so I haven’t had any problems.
Seriously, however, I suppose it is possible. Bedbugs like to live in cracks and holes in wooden furnishings, and since most of us have wooden benchwork I guess anything is possible. I sometimes wonder whether bed bugs are really that big of a problem, or if it’s just an unusually large outbreak in New York City that has brought the issue to the fore.
The other night my wife woke me up to tell me a bear was in our yard. I rolled over and said it is probably just a deer. “Oh yea she says, when was the last time you heard a deer growl.?” She has a point, but I still didn’t get up. [:S]
Go put a piece of your bedding (or anything else in your spotless home) under your Microscope and have a look. Let’s put things in perspective here. No matter how clean and sanitized your house is, your toilet seat is still one of the cleaner things in it. Chemicals in all the commercial cleaners we use are generally more harmful than what mother nature puts in our homes.