Did I pick up a trojan chair?

January 15, 2009 6:41 PM

Should I be worried that my sidewalk find has bedbugs, and what can I do to protect myself? Or should I just throw it out?

I've been wanting a papasan chair for months, but because I'm a cheapskate, I haven't gone out and bought one. So I was excited to discover on my walk home from work a papasan chair frame & mattress sitting out by the trash. After hovering for a while to make sure no one was coming to pick it up and that it was definitely trash, I decided to take it.

However, bed bugs have been a big problem in my area (Cambridge, MA) and now I'm worried about infesting my home. The chair is fairly worn, so maybe it was a rich kid or someone who just doesn't have enough room anymore, but other than that, why else would someone throw out a chair?

I did not take the mattress - only the wood frame, although upon googling, I realize that if one was carrying bugs, the other likely is. The frame is currently sitting out on my back porch until I decide what to do with it, but the weather's been really nasty lately so I'd like to bring it inside ASAP, if I'm going to bring it inside at all.

A few questions:
~ What are the chances that the chair has bedbugs?
~ Is there anything I can do to nuke them, if it does?
~ What would you do in my situation?

posted by shaun uh to home & garden (38 comments total)

You want no part of any piece of furniture that has so much as been in the same area code as bedbugs in its lifetime. I've never had them myself, but everything I have ever read indicates that they are a major nightmare to rid yourself of. Do not invite them into your home.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 6:47 PM on January 15

Kill it with fire. The mattress at least. I have no idea what a papasan chair is but could you, like, ditch the mattress, give the frame a good sterilizing, and get a new mattress?
posted by turgid dahlia at 6:50 PM on January 15

Cambridge, MA? Sidewalk find? You're running a very serious risk. Your area's had endemic bedbug problems for the past couple of years. It's NOT worth risking.
posted by crapmatic at 6:50 PM on January 15

I personally wouldn't chance it.
A new one might be expensive,
but you'll have peace of mind.
What is the price of paranoia?

Bedbugs can squeeze into the
smallest of cracks. Looking down
on them they are quite apparent,
but from the side, they are just a
sliver.

If you must bring it in, and you
realize you do have bedbugs,
people recommend that you
spray this tick and lice spray
for pets all around the floor and
edges of your floor. Essentially,
it fucks up any baby bedbug's
nervous system so they never
reach puberty, and hence, can
never reproduce.
posted by Sully at 6:53 PM on January 15

DO NOT DO THIS.

The risk of bedbugs far outweighs the promise of a free chair mattress. It's like saying "I heard someone dropped a 20 dollar bill in this cave, and there's only a 35% chance of me being mauled by a bear if I try to go get it!"

There is virtually no way to cleanse something that has bedbugs, and virtually no getting rid of bedbugs once you invite them into your home.
posted by Damn That Television at 6:54 PM on January 15

I think if you leave it in the freezing cold for a week that should do them in. The frame, not the mattress.
posted by bolognius maximus at 6:54 PM on January 15

There's a papasan chair frame (no mattress) on Pier 1 for $69. Not getting bedbugs is worth way more than $69. Ditch the find and save your pennies for a new chair.
posted by kate blank at 6:57 PM on January 15

I stayed in a hotel room for three nights. On the third night I turned on my light to go to the bathroom and saw a little creature on my pillow. Over the next week I broke out all over my body in extremely unpleasant, painful sores which hung around for days. I had to throw away some of my belongings and live in terror for several months, afraid I would discover a bed bug crawling up the bed sheet. Even one means an infestation which is difficult-to-impossible to remove from your house, short of burning the place down. GET IT OUT OF YOUR HOUSE NOW! That's my advice, right there. And always put your luggage on the shelf in your hotel room, rather than on the floor.
posted by perfectlylegal at 6:58 PM on January 15

Just to clarify - it's not in my house right now, it's on my back porch. Unless bed bugs are nasty enough that they could have jumped from the wooden frame to my jacket in the space of 5-10 minutes I should be ok. The question is whether there's anything I could do to the frame to ensure it doesn't have bed bugs before bringing it into the house. If there isn't, I will just ditch it.
posted by shaun uh at 7:06 PM on January 15

A coworker (okay, an undergraduate who works in the lab) of my graduate student husband had roommates who picked up a free mattress off the sidewalk. Had bedbugs. He ended up with some nasty bites. My husband forbid said undergraduate from going anywhere near his personal space for at least a week.

Get rid of the stuff. NOW.

This comes from someone who lives on the other side of the river.
posted by zizzle at 7:06 PM on January 15

Bed bugs ARE nasty enough to jump from frame to jacket in that time. They thrive in wooden furniture, and this area is known for having massive bedbug infestations. There is nothing - absolutely nothing - you can do to the frame to ensure that it doesn't have bedbugs.

Get rid of it, immediately.
posted by ellF at 7:13 PM on January 15

The question is whether there's anything I could do to the frame to ensure it doesn't have bed bugs before bringing it into the house.

I don't know bed bugs from Adam but they're insects, right? So:

1. Cover frame with a big old sheet of plastic or tarp. You have some big sheets of plastic lying around, don't you?

2. Set off a bug bomb underneath the plastic (put it in the driveway or something, don't keep it on the lawn)

3. Wait until bug bomb is spent (5-10 minutes depending on brand)

4. Remove plastic/tarp, give the frame a preliminary clean and maybe a few bangs on the ground to dislodge the poor little critters, move it to a different spot, then give it a thorough disinfecting with a wood-safe household cleaner (the sort you use to clean your kitchen benches), leave it to air for a while, then give it some wood polish or something.
posted by turgid dahlia at 7:13 PM on January 15

Oh my christ, chuck it as far from you as possible immediately. Are you serious??
posted by tristeza at 7:24 PM on January 15 [1 favorite]

Having recently heard a horrifying bedbug story on NPR, I also advocate getting rid of it. Not worth the risk.
posted by OolooKitty at 7:24 PM on January 15 [1 favorite]

You can encase it securely in plastic and let it sit for about a year, to starve them out. But by that time you would probably have saved up enough money to buy a new chair.
posted by phoenixy at 7:27 PM on January 15

@turgid dahlia: Your method will not kill bed bugs. Please - we all suffer in this area from the infestation, and uninformed advice is not helpful.
posted by ellF at 7:29 PM on January 15

Okay, you all have persuaded me. In fact, you all have terrified me.

Two final questions then:

~ Do you agree with ellF that the bed bugs could've gotten on my jacket in the 5-10 minutes I was carrying the frame? If so, is there anything to be gained from giving my jacket a look-over or washing it with something?

~ The trash doesn't come until Monday morning. Am I risking anything by leaving the frame on my back porch until then? We absolutely don't go back there (today was the first time I'd been there in months, actually) and it's sub-freezing temperatures for the next few days, but I wouldn't want the bugs to infest the porch and last until the summer when we start using it again.
posted by shaun uh at 7:31 PM on January 15

Ditch it.

"Free" furniture has been thrown away for a reason. I have found this out through painful experience.
posted by grapefruitmoon at 7:36 PM on January 15

The question is whether there's anything I could do to the frame to ensure it doesn't have bed bugs before bringing it into the house.

There are things you can try, yes.

1) Keep it outside and well away from any exterior doors/windows. Spray the shit out of the thing with a pyrethrin spray. Daily. For, oh, six months. Pay special attention to those wicker-wrapped joints. Do not come in contact with the chair while you're treating it. If you do, remove your clothes, wash them in hot hot water, dry them in a hot hot dryer, and wrap them in plastic for the remaining six months of your free chair's treatment.

2) After step 1, six months later, ask yourself how bad you still want this free chair. If the answer is "really, really, really, really bad," go ahead and bring it inside.

3) Spend the next several weeks scratching at real or imagined bugs, because you're going to have one or the other.

The alternative, of course, is to follow that above link to the $69 chair at Pier One.

Anyone who's suffered a bedbug infestation (and I have) will forever counsel you against incorporating free furniture into your life. You can risk it if you want, but you risk becoming one of us proselytizing converts.
posted by mudpuppie at 7:36 PM on January 15

Oh Jesus throw it as far away as you can. Get rid of the jacket, too.
posted by trip and a half at 7:37 PM on January 15

Go to the house where you got it, put a note on the door. "Did the papasan chair by the street have bedbugs?"
posted by jefficator at 8:05 PM on January 15 [2 favorites]

Two weeks below freezing will kill bedbugs. Two weeks above 120 F will also do the job. Use a hot clothes dryer for the jacket.
posted by hortense at 8:07 PM on January 15

Get rid of the jacket, too.

Really? This is my $100 heavy duty winter coat we're talking about here. Also, the coat has already been in the house. If they can jump from the frame to my coat, they've probably already jumped from my coat to the rest of the house, right?
posted by shaun uh at 8:07 PM on January 15

Jacket immediately goes in sealed plastic bag (not just tie string garbage bag) and taken to the dry cleaners immediately. Or you can put it through the hottest setting of your drier if it is the kind of material that can take it.
posted by rmless at 8:18 PM on January 15 [1 favorite]

rmless speaks sooth: the highest setting on most standard clothes dryers will kill them -- and more importantly, their eggs -- in the course of a single drying cycle.

And hortense may or may not be right with the two weeks above 120 F being fatal; I don't know. Pest control places with enough environmental consciousness to look beyond the let's-just-spray-poison-everywhere approach will often use a device that is like unto a nuclear-powered space heater. Put it in a room, plug it in, seal the doors and windows, and turn it on: it will heat the room to around 80 degrees celsius (~190 Fahrenheit, if that's your bag) for several hours. That will wipe out pretty much anything above bacteria size, in my finding.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 9:15 PM on January 15

It is unlikely that you got bedbugs on your jacket, but to be safe put it in the dryer at high heat for 20 minutes. See here for way more information than you'll ever want to read: http://bedbugger.com/2007/05/18/dryer/
posted by kms at 9:51 PM on January 15

Helpful link
posted by hortense at 11:08 PM on January 15

There's NO way I'd bring that furniture into my house.
posted by gnutron at 12:42 AM on January 16

Oh god bedbugs. I got them when i was in Germany. Started out as itchy hives all over my arm, then a couple strange bite/sores. Went for a weekend trip and I guess they got hungry, because when I came, I woke up in the middle of the night COVERED in bedbugs. No exaggeration, I had easily 50-60 of them on me, and that was the big ones. Spend the next couple of nights sleeping in a bathtub until I could find alternate housing, and ended up with angry red half-dollar sized welts all over me) plus more itchy hives.

My boyfriend got bedbugs while at Marine drill. He ended up being somewhat allergic, and his bites turned into giant, oozing, gangrenous looking sores. The biggest one was a good five inches long on his chest. It was one of the most repulsive things I've ever seen. (Lucky for him I'm not that queasy, but we kept the lights off and he wore most of his clothing for a long time during happy fun time. It was appalling, he looked like he had a flesh-eating bacteria or something.) He still has the scars from it.

DO NOT RISK IT.
posted by internet!Hannah at 12:49 AM on January 16

Run from anything that has bedbugs. RUN RUN RUN. They carry diseases, they are almost impossible to get out of your house once they're inside, and they will make your life a living hell. I've never had them in my house, but I know people who have, and it was a NIGHTMARE. No street find is worth that, no matter how spectacular.
posted by sarabeth at 1:34 AM on January 16

Really? This is my $100 heavy duty winter coat we're talking about here. Also, the coat has already been in the house. If they can jump from the frame to my coat, they've probably already jumped from my coat to the rest of the house, right?

It's possible, but if you only wore the jacket for a short time while carrying the mattress, and it hasn't been in the house for long, you *should* be OK--there would have been only a couple who would have made it to your jacket, and it seems not-so-likely that one of those few then hopped onto something else in your house. Still, it only takes one to lay eggs, and if it happens, it'll cost you thousands of dollars to kill the ensuing infestation. Treat that jacket like it's infected with typhus: sealed-plastic-bag-in-a-sealed-plastic-bag, take to the cleaners and tell them to nuke the site from orbit.
posted by Mayor West at 5:04 AM on January 16 [1 favorite]

>shaun uh asked: ~ Do you agree with ellF that the bed bugs could've gotten on my jacket in the 5-10 minutes I was carrying the frame? If so, is there anything to be gained from giving my jacket a look-over or washing it with something?

It is possible. I've had a cockroach find it's way into my home this way. Luckily I found him and squashed him before he made his home in my home.
posted by JJ86 at 6:27 AM on January 16

Rules for deciding whether or not to take furniture off the street in a bed-bug-infested area

1. Absolutely nothing upholstered on it or around it
2. There has to be an obvious reason for its disposal--broken in some way--and the broken piece has to be there with it to indicate that it was broken recently
3. Really nice, i.e. hardwood, nice design

I have many wonderful pieces I've gotten from the street but it doesn't look like yours is one of them.

There are ways to kill bedbugs but this frame isn't really worth it
posted by sondrialiac at 7:33 AM on January 16

Here is a good article in TONY about assessing bedbug risk. Personally, I would toss it. Bedbugs are a bitch and getting rid of them is even more of a bitch. If you bring them home, it is going to end up costing you more to get rid of them that just buying a brand new chair.
posted by slograffiti at 8:47 AM on January 16

Ditch the chair. There's no reason to get rid of the jacket. You may want to have it dry-cleaned, though.
posted by oaf at 5:51 PM on January 16

Definitely don't pitch your coat without out least doing as jefficator says and trying to find out if the chair was infested. There are signs you can look for too (I'm mean to check the likelihood that eggs could've gotten on the coat--I agree with others that the chair's not worth the risk). If the mattress is still out there, look for droppings on it or the frame that look kind of like mildew.

Heat will kill bedbugs and their eggs--I bake thrifted clothes in the oven for a while, now, first thing after buying. :) If your coat would tolerate it (I do it around 150) maybe you could do this. Below-freezing temps don't kill them; they live in a slowed-down state for quite some time unless the temp goes down below zero for a couple weeks.

All that said, don't panic. I own a four-family house in Queens and one of our tenants brought in an infested futon (duh) and managed to get two of the units infested. Major, horrible pain in the ass, but we got rid of them. Also, it's not true that the bugs spread disease; they're just bitey and disgusting to think about.

I'd move the frame away from your house if possible, only because IF there are bugs in there, I expect they wouldn't just hang around in the cold with no people to bite if there's a house to invade. Still, again, don't get overly worried about it.
posted by torticat at 7:21 PM on January 16 [1 favorite]

Bedbugs are awful, and they're terribly difficult to get rid of. Do not bring this chair into your house. There might be a really good reason it was sitting on the curb.
posted by Savannah at 8:46 AM on January 17

I'm not aware of anything you can do to 100% kill bedbugs on a wood or metal frame/furniture.

But your coat is a different story. Put it in the dryer for a full cycle. The heat from the dryer will kill the bedbugs and any eggs. I got this info 3 months ago from a reliable bedbug site. You may actually only need to get the clothing at a certain temperature for about 5-10 minutes, but just as well to put it in for a full cycle since I don't know exactly when in the cycle it hits the magic temperature.

Good luck!
posted by onlyconnect at 4:08 PM on January 20