Pest Management Professional, May 2018
Continued FroM Page 58 man I think its a bed bug but Ive got to check them back at the lab to make sure Mr Johnson was astonished Bed bugs Ive never heard of them getting inside poultry houses Yep Ive read about it Crawley nodded Especially in organic poultry operations and breederbroiler houses like this here one So theyre sucking blood outta my chickens Yes sir probably so every night Suckin em dry Mr Johnson fell silent and there they were two grown men staring at each other standing dead still in the middle of thousands of gyrating clucking chickens It was as if Crawley had just told the man that the moon was made of cheese No wonder my egg production is down He shook his head What can we do about it Crawley looked up at Mr Johnson his eyes like large ovals roaming around behind his thick glasses Thats the problem sir there aint much can be done as long as these here chickens are around You might can get someone to spray the bugs when the birds are sold off and the house is empty That might be Thanksgiving The big man shook with frustration What am I supposed to do until then Crawley didnt have an answer to that so he headed back toward the wall to collect specimens to confirm the identification back at the office He knew there was a slim chance they could be bat bugs instead of bed bugs Then he would discuss the problem with MJ and Jack B ack at the office in the examination room Crawley looked through a microscope at the bed bug specimens he had collected He carefully checked the pronotum area immediately behind their tiny heads to see how long the setae were He knew the main identifying characteristic of bed bugs was the length of the pronotal setae The setae were twice as long in bat bugs as they were in true bed bugs In this case there was no mistake The setae were short characteristic of true bed bugs Continued on Page 62 60 May 2018 Pest Management Professional mypmp net IllustratIon leo MIchael
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