Too poor for new rugs - no bed bugs, please!

September 11, 2012 7:11 PM

I bought a rug at a thrift store, and while I did some bedbug prevention before putting it in my house, I'm still a worrywart and probably should have sprung for a new rug. Anything else I can do?

In order to keep the peace at my new place, I had to buy some area rugs to protect the wood floor in my bedroom from the claws of my large dog. Fair enough, but area rugs are expensive! I went to St. Vincent De Paul's thrift store, a pretty classy joint, and bought an Ikea rug appeared to be in decent condition. I vacuumed it on the porch (both sides), and managed to fit it in the dryer where it roasted on high for an hour.

But I'm still squicked out. Is home carpet cleaning an option? Any product recommendations for this sort of thing? How soon will I know if I have bedbugs? (Does anyone have them in LA, anyway?)

posted by ablazingsaddle to Home & Garden (5 answers total)

If you vacuumed and dried it for an hour you are almost certainly fine. Honestly, heat is probably the cheapest option for rugs - if you really had it in the dryer for an hour and you are confident that your dryer gets up to 120 degrees (almost all do - I checked mine with an instant-read thermometer and mine is old and cheap but it's fine!) then really you don't need to do anything else except chill out. (You threw away the vacuum bag or else really, REALLY cleaned the vacuum, right?)
posted by Frowner at 7:23 PM on September 11, 2012

Seconding Frowner. Heat above 115 degrees kills bed bugs AND their eggs. If it was in the dryer for an hour you should have no worries.
posted by entropyiswinning at 9:29 PM on September 11, 2012

A dryer for an hour will kill begbugs for sure. If you want to do more bedbug prevention for your peace of mind, you can put the rug in a black garbage bag in your car, and park your car in the sun. Since you're in LA, it will absolutely be above 115 degrees in the bag.

(yes, there are bedbugs in LA - it's good to take precautions, but the dryer by itself is sufficient)
posted by insectosaurus at 10:51 PM on September 11, 2012

a side note. We picked up a cheap rug off amazon. search 'Home Dynamix' on amazon most are free shipping. P.S. most are weird 90's modernist types.
posted by couchdive at 4:09 AM on September 12, 2012

Response by poster: No bedbugs yet. Thanks everyone!
posted by ablazingsaddle at 3:47 PM on September 26, 2012