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This year DPR is sharing seasonal IPM insights featuring a question and answer dialogue with previous IPM Achievement Award winners. This month's IPM Insights are from Dr. Andrew Sutherland, Urban Integrated Pest Management Advisor, and part of a team that was awarded a DPR IPM Achievement Award in 2021 for research and education facilitating IPM adoption in urban spaces. University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources' Urban IPM Advisors conduct research, provide training, and publish resources to promote the adoption of IPM throughout California.
We asked Dr. Sutherland about his perspectives on using IPM to prevent and manage bed bugs in hospitality settings.
How do you use safer, more sustainable IPM practices to manage bed bugs?
I work with pest control operators and other pest management professionals to develop proactive IPM programs for bed bugs that include regular monitoring of ALL units in a housing or hospitality setting. This ensures that we will detect bed bug infestations early and will consider the entire property as a unit, acknowledging that bed bugs readily move between and among units.
Bed bugs should always be managed via proactive IPM programs. Such programs include education of all stakeholders and regular monitoring of all residential or lodging units as well as shared community spaces. Bed bug introductions can be prevented by awareness when traveling and via inspections for hitchhiking bugs on personal belongings and secondhand goods. Bed bug infestations can be prevented by cultural tactics such as clutter reduction. When bugs are detected, they can be removed or controlled using physical tactics such as vacuums, lint rollers, and household laundering (on the hot settings). Professional heat treatments, desiccant treatments, and residual insecticide treatments can be used for more serious or persistent infestations.
What is your top tip for addressing bed bugs in hospitality?
Teach housekeeping and janitorial staff to recognize and report bed bugs, their eggs, and their signs (such as fecal spots and cast skins). Utilize a regular monitoring program, such as weekly or biweekly checks of pitfall traps or harborage traps.
What do you think is important for those in hospitality to know about bed bugs?
Your facility is under constant threat of bed bug introduction. Regular monitoring will ensure that your lodging units don’t become infested with a reproducing population of bed bugs that will feed on your guests. Finding one or just a few bed bugs, especially adult bugs, may mean that you have intercepted an introduction; in such cases, treatments may be unnecessary. Finding eggs or multiple juvenile bugs may mean that you have a reproducing population, necessitating treatment.
Why is using IPM and sustainable pest management important for managing pests in California?
The goals of IPM are to successfully maintain pest populations below unacceptable levels and to reduce negative impacts on the community and the environment. In the case of bed bugs, one bug represents an unacceptable level, so constant vigilance and readiness is required. Indoor pesticide exposure to people and pets is the most serious negative impact associated with insecticide treatments for bed bugs; these should only be made when monitoring deems them necessary.
Dr. Andrew Sutherland, Cooperative Extension Advisor,
UC ANR's Statewide Integrated Pest Management Program,
2021 IPM Achievement Award Winner
About Andrew Sutherland
Dr. Andrew Sutherland is the University of California’s Urban Integrated Pest Management Advisor for the San Francisco Bay Area. This extension position is part of the UC’s Statewide IPM Program (UC IPM) and is provided by the UC’s Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources (UC ANR). In this position, Andrew serves pest management professionals by conducting applied research and education programs that are informed by regular needs assessments. These programs aim to develop new IPM strategies, or to adapt and implement IPM strategies already available, for key household, structural, and industrial pests. Andrew’s current projects involve topics such as biting mites in homes and other structures, advanced monitoring tools for bed bugs, educational IPM videos, and hands-on education and training for the pest control industry.
Dr. Andrew Sutherland's Recommended IPM Resources
What is IPM?
 Integrated pest management, or IPM, is a sustainable pest management strategy you can use everyday. IPM focuses on a variety of pest prevention and non-toxic or least-toxic pest management techniques to effectively solve pest problems. IPM strategies use practices that exclude pests so they can’t cause problems and use pesticides only as a last resort. By using integrated pest management practices, it’s possible to effectively, safely, and more sustainably manage pests at your school or child care center while protecting staff, children, and the environment.
What is SPM?
 Sustainable Pest Management (SPM) is a holistic, whole-system approach applicable in agricultural and other managed ecosystems and urban and rural communities that builds on the concept of integrated pest management (IPM) to include the wider context of the three sustainability pillars: Human Health & Social Equality, Environmental Protections, and Economic Vitality.
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