How to Get Rid of Roaches
Do you have a roach problem in your house, and do you want to know how to get rid of them? Roaches, also known as cockroaches, are an annoyance and a serious problem in any household. As of 2010, there are over 4500 known species of cockroaches. If your house does have these pests, you need to get rid of them.
If you have cockroaches in your house, you first need to find out where they are coming from and use extermination techniques.
Start by try to follow a cockroach back to its nest. Cockroaches usually don’t come out during the day, so you may have to follow them at night with a flashlight.
If it is difficult for you to follow the roaches, you may have to just search your houses for cracks or holes. Roaches can also enter your house through other openings, such as through the drains or the vents.
If you find out where the roaches are coming from, you can localize your extermination attempts.
If you are unable to determine where the cockroaches are coming from, you can still eliminate them from your household. The first approach you can try is to create roach food.
Exterminating with Roach Food
Roach food is a part boric acid, part white flour, and part white sugar. You will need to apply this several times before it adequately kills the group of cockroaches that is infesting your home. You should place this mixture in the back of your kitchen drawers, in the back of your kitchen cabinets, under your stove, and wherever else you feel that the roaches are travelling through. The sugar attracts the roaches to the food. The white flour traps them, and the boric acid kills them.
Do not be alarmed if your pets eat the food, the roach food is not extremely toxic and will not hurt your animals. If the roach food is unsuccessful, you can also try using roach traps. You can buy roach traps at your local hardware store.
One of the most effective ways to get rid of roaches is by using cockroach bait. You can also buy this at the hardware store, or even at your local grocery store. A cockroach bait is a childproof container that has a slow working poison, and an attraction for the roaches. The cockroaches will eat the poison, and transport the poison back to the nest. Once in the nest, the poison will kill all of the pests.
Different Types of Cockroaches
The best known cockroaches are probably the American cockroach, the German cockroach, the Oriental cockroach, and the Asian cockroach. The American cockroach can grow up to approximately one inch long, and is the largest cockroach of this group.
The German cockroach is smaller, and only gets to about half an inch long. The Asian cockroach and the Oriental cockroach grow to about half an inch, and a little less than one inch respectively. Cockroaches are classified in the Order of Blattaria, and their Superorder is Dictyoptera.
Problems Associated with Cockroaches
If you do have cockroaches, you need to know the dangers and annoyances that come with these pests. First, cockroaches sometimes have a foul odor that ruins the smell of your home if you have a great number of them.
Further, cockroaches eat both human and pet food that you may have out in your house.
Cockroaches are more dangerous than simply being a nuisance. They can carry dangerous microbes on their bodies that are hazardous to humans, and sometimes even lethal. Some humans even have allergic reactions to cockroaches, and cockroaches can cause asthma attacks because they carry a type of protein that is linked with allergic reactions.