For the better part of the past decade bedbugs were my #1 fear in life. Not a terrorist attack on New York, not my beloved Florida State Seminoles losing to those redneck Florida Gators from Gainesville, and buying bad molly at a music festival because sometimes you just have to roll with the punches. I’ve lost quite a bit of sleep over the years worrying about bedbugs, anytime I’d hear about a friend, colleague, or co-worker contracting bedbugs I’d lose my shit.
As it turns out I’ve actually been protecting myself all these years by sleeping on the color of sheets which scientists have determined bedbugs hate the most. Conversely, researchers also determined the color combination of sheets that bedbugs LOVE the most, so if you own this color combo you need to ditch those sheets NOW or risk living amidst a full blown bedbug colony.
The unfortunate reality is the atrocious pests do seem to prefer hiding among certain hues, according to a study in the Journal of Medical Entomology. Researchers at the University of Florida and elsewhere put bedbugs in dishes with paper “tents” of varying colors. They gave them 10 minutes to scoot to these enclaves, and then noted which attracted the densest accumulations of vermin. The findings: The bugs gathered in larger numbers under red and black tents and smaller numbers in yellow and green ones.
I’m going to level with you bros, when I first moved to NYC about 9 years ago I had no idea what bedbugs were. I’d managed to somehow go through my entire pre-NYC life without ever hearing about these bloodsucking little fucks. Then I moved to New York and the blinds were pulled back, revealing a terrifying world of swarming bedbugs sucking my blood out between my fingers and around my eyes, living on my ceramic plates, terrorizing me while I sleep. I managed to live in NYC for 8 years without ever getting bedbugs, but every time there would be a mosquito in my room and I’d wake up with a bug bite I was convinced the sky was falling. Everything I’d own would go into those black industrial trash bags and straight to the cleaners, then I’d see some big ass mosquito and realize that I’d once again overreacted (seriously, why TF are the Summer mosquitoes in NY so gigantic?!?).
As noted, these findings were published in the Journal of Medical Entomology, and you can read the findings in full if you follow that link. If you’re looking for some quick analysis though you should head on over to UPROXX who has a great rundown of what these findings mean for you as an individual.
Bed Sheets Image courtesy of Shutterstock.com