7 Ways to Get Rid of Roaches in Your Home

By Shannon Couillard

7 Ways to Get Rid of Roaches in Your Home thegearhunt.com

Homeowners can panic when they see roaches in their homes. Not only are they just nasty and repulsive, they also pose a health concern. Cockroaches are one of many pests that are known for carrying diseases can they can even cause allergic reactions. Finding out why and how roaches are gaining access to your home is critical to the overall health of your family and yourself.

The thing is, when it comes to roaches, they are incredibly resilient. Once they have gained access to your home, it can be more than a little bit difficult to get rid of them. Knowing why they have decided to infest your home is critical when it comes to getting rid of them and keeping them out. Most of the time, the largest reason for them being in a home is food. It might be cardboard, bird feed, pet food, or even human food. Ensuring that any food items are sealed tightly is imperative when it comes to keeping them out.

It takes more than simply spraying insecticides and putting down dust or bait to get rid of roaches in your home. Roaches can and do get into everything, they multiply with amazing speed, and they can live for months with no food and as long as 2 weeks with no water.

These are small pests that pose a large challenge, but if you have the right tools, and the right roach killing products, you will triumph in your battle with the roaches by following a simple program for roach management. The best way to rid yourself of a roach infestation involves a complete process for treatment that includes 2 basic steps. These are sanitation and preparation. You will also need to use a few products.

The following steps for the treatment of roaches will get rid of any species, including Smoky Brown, Oriental, Brown Banded, Wood, German, and American roaches.

Get Rid of Water, Food, and Places Where They Can Hide

If you eliminate what attracts these nasty little critters, like water, food, and hiding places, this can be critical to both getting rid of them and to prevent them from coming back. Most programs for treating roach problems will not work if you skip or poorly implement this step. You need to get rid of what attracts them, which includes as many of their water and food sources as possible, while also sealing off places where they may like to hide.

Eliminate Sources of Food

Getting rid of sources where the critters can find food is one of the most critical steps when it comes to roach control. Cleaning your kitchen as well as the other parts of your house requires hard work and dedication, but they are a necessary evil when it comes to a living space that is roach free.

Clean Appliances – Roaches that live in your kitchen can live off of things like food spills and grease both behind and under your appliances. You will need to clean behind and under your dishwasher, toaster, microwave, refrigerator, and stove as well as underneath and around the sink.

Clean and Empty Cabinets – Food spills and crumbs from food products that are stored provide roaches with a tasty buffet. Clean thoroughly to get rid of this source of food for them.

Keep all Food in Sealed Containers – These little pests are small enough that they can get into packaging made from cardboard or even bags or boxes that aren’t tightly sealed. Store your food in hard plastic, glass, or metal sealable containers.

Limit the Consumption of Food to a Single Room in the House – Keeping all eating and food contained in one part of your home will eliminate things like spills and crumbs. This can limit the infestation to a single area of your home.

Clean the Kitchen Daily – The nasty little critters tend to come out to feed when it is dark, so making sure that you clean your kitchen each night before you go to bed means that there will be nothing left out for hunting roaches to find and eat. Wipe down all of the countertops, wash all of the dishes, clean the floor, and make sure that all food is securely put away.

Sweep or Vacuum all of the Other Areas Every Few Days – Picking up things like egg sacs, body parts, roach skins or feces, and stray crumbs will assist in keeping your home clean.

You should also be sure that you empty or cover all pet food containers each night and keep your garbage cans covered and clean.

Get Rid of Sources of Water

Water is something else that you will need to keep away from roaches. It can be difficult to get rid of every source of water, but you will still need to get rid of as many of them as possible.

Empty the drip tray from under the refrigerator.
Dry any wet toothbrushes as well as possible before placing them into sealed containers or bags.
Water dishes for pets should either be put outside each night or dried completely and then refilled each morning.

Put any wet sponges or dish rags into plastic storage bags that are airtight each night. Either put them into the washing machine immediately or hang them outside to dry.
Before going to bed, dry all showers, tubs, and sinks and plug their drains.
Fix any sweating and/or leaking pipes.

Eliminate Hiding Places

Roaches like to hide during the day and they prefer to be in places that are small and dark. If you eliminate any of their potential hiding places, they will be forced to find a new place to live. You should:

Put tape over any crevices and/or holes in appliances or other household items in those areas that have a high level of roach traffic. Places that roaches like to hide include small appliances and computers.
Make sure that your door frames and windows are tight and free of any gaps to prevent them getting in from the outside.

Close any holes that might surround things like wall or light fixtures, or pipes, with material such as Stuff It Copper Mesh.
Seal any and all crevices and/or cracks by using a caulking gun.

Using IGRs, Sprays, and Baits

Once you have finished preparing and sanitizing your home, you will be ready to start using a variety of products to get rid of those nasty little pests. We recommend that you use 3 critical products in any roach control program – an Insect Growth Regulator to ensure that the bugs can’t reproduce while you attempt to eliminate the ones that are already there, a bait that will assist in drawing them out and eliminating those that might be hidden, and a concentrated insecticide that will quickly kill any sort of roaches that are active.

It is also recommended that you rotate any baits you put out every few months if your program of roach control is ongoing in order to avoid them becoming resistant to the bait. You can find kits with a variety of active ingredients which makes the rotation of them easier.

Baiting

Aside from sanitation, baiting for roaches is the most essential and critical step to roach control programs. The idea of roach bait is for the roaches to feed on the bait that is poisoned. They then contaminate as many as 40 more roaches through feces, contact, or from other roaches feeding on its dead body. This is a domino effect that will knock out roach populations at a rate that can be incredible. It is recommended that roach baits are rotated up to 4 times per year to avoid bait resistance and aversion. Bait stations and gel baits should be strategically placed if you want them to have the greatest efficacy.

Think about putting these:

In drawers, under railings, and in corners.
In any crevices and/or cracks around wood or shelves.
Behind vanities and medicine cabinets.

Under and behind bathroom fixtures.
Around cables, cords, and pipes that come from the wall.
In stored boxes and/or paper bags.

In corners under cabinets and sinks.
Under, next to, and behind the stove.
Behind things that hang on walls, like posters, clocks, and pictures.

Behind countertops and kitchen cabinets.

Baits need to be replaced or reapplied once every 3 weeks or when they seem to be gone. Continue placing bait until you don’t see any more roaches.

Insect Growth Regulators

Even if sanitation, insecticides, and baits work successfully to kill the adult roach population, there will still be ootheca, or egg capsules, that will hatch within a month or two after you have seen the last adult pest. This is the reason every successful roach control program has to include an IGR. These IGRs are a pheromone that is synthetic, and it can impede and disrupt the life cycles of insects at the larval stage or even in the egg. The thought behind it is that if it can’t reach adulthood, it can’t reproduce. So, basically, IGRs are a form of birth control for roaches or other types of pests, and they help to keep their populations under control by keeping both current and any future infestations from creating more generations.

IGRs are available in a few different forms. You can get them in point source stations, concentrated liquids, and aerosols. Each form is quite effective and selecting one to meet your needs shouldn’t be too difficult. If you find spraying inconvenient, you might want to go with the point source stations. If you like the thought of a spray, but you are hesitant to measure and mix chemicals or don’t want to have to buy a hand pump sprayer, the aerosol might be your best option. If you have large areas to worry about and budget is a factor, you might want to go with the concentrated liquid.

Using Concentrated Insecticide – Measure First, Then Mix, and Finally, Spray

Measure and then mix any concentrated roach spray you purchase as the product label recommends. Apply this right along your baseboards, in crevices and cracks, under your appliances, around all of your door and window frames, and in those areas where your utilities – like wires, pipes, and cables – enter your home. Be careful to spray away from exact places where you have put bait because this can contaminate those baits and then the roaches will stay away from them. Reapply any insecticide sprays at intervals that are recommended on the label of the sprays.

Be Patient

Depending on how bad your infestation problem is, it might take anywhere from just a few weeks to as long as half a year or more to get the problem under control. The thing is, infestations don’t just pop up overnight, and they certainly won’t go away with a quickness either. You can assist in monitoring your infestation by using what are known as glue boards under your appliances, behind your toilets, and under your cabinets, as well as in any other areas of your home where there has been an infestation. Check these glue boards (that are essentially traps) on a weekly basis to monitor any progress that is being made. Continue all of the treatments you are using until you cease to find roaches on the glue boards.

Every method we have talked about here today is effective, but the real magic to termination of an infestation is to determine which method is working best for the current problem. There isn’t a wrong method or a right one. What is critical is that those nasty roaches are killed and gotten rid of. The methods you have read about here today are meant to assist home owners with how they can rid themselves of roach infestations. You know the saying ‘your home is your castle’? It is true, and you need to treat it as if it truly were a castle. The thing is, roaches couldn’t care less about whose home they are invading. All they want is a home, food, and water. It is best to get rid of a roach problem the very instant you see the first one. Remember that for every roach you see, 3,000 more are hidden in your walls. By starting with extermination the very minute you see a roach, you will have more success than if you wait any time at all.