While bed bugs damage the skin carpet beetles mostly damage your belongings.
Carpet beetle vs bed bug bites.
If only one person in the.
The good news is that this means carpet beetles don t bite humans.
Bed bugs are in the family cimicidae while carpet beetles are in the family dermestids.
These bristles can cause an allergic reaction on human skin similar in appearance to bed bug bites though carpet beetles do not actually bite humans.
In addition carpet beetle larvae will shed their skins as they grow.
Bed bugs eat human blood and carpet beetle larvae feed on wool and animal based materials.
The difference here is that bed bugs have a mouth made for piercing skin and sucking blood while carpet beetles have a mouth made for chewing on plants and other fibrous material.
As stated previously carpet beetles don t bite humans.
Bed bugs actually create red itchy welts on the skin from biting you while the carpet beetle doesn t bite at all but causes a similar red itchy welt due to an allergic reaction from the prickly little hairs on the carpet beetle larvae.
However carpet beetles can damage fabrics and bed bugs can bite people.
Carpet beetles typically breed in areas where edible fibers are plentiful whether that be the old rug in the attic or vents where a lot of animal fur has collected.
Bedbugs contain an anticoagulant and an anesthetic into the skin with its mouth thus resulting in an actual bite.
If you search for bed bug signs and find no traces carpet beetles could be the pest especially if you are getting a number of bites every night.
They can be very easily confused with one another.
Both can be difficult to detect and have many of the same results.
The moral to this story is.
These discarded casings look much like the shells of bed bug larvae.
For those of you who are a little bit more impatient i ll say that there are 5 main differences between carpet beetles and bed bugs.
Most people experience some sort of allergic reaction when they come into contact with carpet beetle larvae.
Both pests can be worrisome and may create stress.
However carpet beetles and bed bugs do leave similar evidence on your skin.
It is easy in this case to assume that they experienced bed bugs bites.
Both carpet beetles and bed bugs can cause welt like rashes.
Itchy bites that occur while you sleep in your bed.
Carpet beetles are not bed bugs.
Both insects can breed fast and may remain hidden for a while before you start to notice them.
Check the area with a magnifying glass for the shed larval skins remembering that even a single carpet beetle skin could result in multiple bite like reactions due.