How Did Bed Bugs Originate?
WouterThere are a variety of ways that bedbugs can invade your home. Bedbugs can be brought into your home by animals and can also enter your home through holes that have been drilled for electrical wire. Bed bugs are particularly attracted to the warmth and carbon dioxide that humans produce, so they will usually prefer areas where humans sleep.
Some researchers believe that bedbugs first evolved in caves in the Middle East. However, there is no solid proof that they originated there. A recent study conducted by the University of Sheffield found that bedbugs were more than a hundred million years old. The insects were first known to feed on bats, and then moved to humans as our civilizations evolved.
In the early Cretaceous, bedbugs may have parasitized a species of bat. Phylogenetic analyses show that bats and bedbugs evolved at about 115 million years ago. This is much earlier than the appearance of the first birds. Therefore, this family may have emerged much earlier than humans.
Bedbugs have been found fossilized in Egypt and the Middle East. They are also known to have been introduced to Europe, including Germany and France in the 1200s. After they populated Europe, they eventually made their way to the Americas.
