Cockroaches

Cockroaches couldn’t possibly be that hard to kill, could they? After all, they are simply bugs. Bugs can be squashed, can’t they? Excellent points and questions, but there is a reason that it only takes the mere mention of a cockroach to send property owners into a panic. With their sheer resilience and determination, cockroaches have easily grown into one of the most feared insects in the world.

You can pound them under your feet all you want, but a single cockroach can survive up to nearly 900 times its body weight in crushing force. That’s pretty impressive, right?

Sure it is, but with the help of our tried and tested systematic approaches, we can help you rid your property entirely of cockroaches. Not only can we help you rid your property, but with a little strategic planning and customizing, we can help you instill preventive measures that will deter this horrible predator from returning.

Gearing Up For Battle

You might as well go ahead and get yourself into a war mentality because that is exactly what is required to completely eradicate a foe as formidable as the cockroach. Most people think it’s so easy to crush a roach crawling along the floor, why are they so hard to eliminate from the property? That’s an excellent question and learning the truth behind that very question is key to successful elimination.

Despite the reputation and sheer resilience of cockroaches, there are only 4 key points that need to be followed for complete and successful eradication. No doubt these key points are not mere 5 minutes tasks, but before you go crazy with worry and hectic, and spend hundreds of dollars on bombs and cleaners, take the time to consider our 4 key points.

• Acting fast and completing every task with complete thoroughness without giving up will be the mentality you need to take on
• Successful and complete eradication is about attacking and removing the entire colony, not just a few single roaches or even a few hundred
• The approach will require a combination of tools, knowledge, and treatments. Rotating your approaches and keeping things fresh will off your greatest odds of success
• Knowledge truly is king! The more you learn about your enemy, the more informed approach you’ll be able to make

Why So Hard To Eliminate?

Before you start your trek ahead, you need to understand why roaches have grown into such a feared and formidable foe. Honestly, it is pretty simple when broken down into the simplest of forms and answers. Here is why roaches are so hard to completely eradicate from a property:

• They not only possess the innate ability to survive on little to nothing, but they can thrive on nothing
• Their reproductive abilities are uncanny, some might say otherworldly. They are constantly having babies
• Thanks to their innate ability to thrive on little to nothing, the menace spends most of its time lounging in safety. Why risk danger and go out for resources when you can do just fine with nothing?

The Stages Of Infestation

A simple roach problem typically only starts with one or two roaches, mucking through your freshly planted mulch, swimming around in your leaking sewer, hiding in your grocery bag, or hitching a ride on that secondhand sofa you just recently added to the entertainment room.

Eventually, they will make their way onto your property.

The thing that makes the scenario even scarier is that you don’t necessarily need a dirtied or cluttered home to attract the threat.

Sure, cockroaches are going to do much better in clutter and dirt, but major infestations have been reported in some of the cleanest, most neatly organized homes in the world. If you live in a small suburb or neighborhood with closely-knit homes, you are in major trouble if your neighbor has an infestation and is doing nothing to stop or contain it. As you can imagine, the same goes for condos, apartments, and adjoining rooms. It’ll take riding the entire complex or area to remove the threat.

The best time to attack any infestation is when your foe only possesses single digits. Of course, that generally never happens because you don’t live in a perfect world. Since you’ve likely already missed your first opportunity, the next best time is right now! (Remember the first key point!)

The Importance Of Key Cockroach-Killing Tools

Getting back to the key points, it’s going to take a multitude of strategies and weapons to successfully rid your property of the infestation. Now, do not misunderstand that statement. This doesn’t mean simply running out and buying up the latest in cockroach-killing technology. You’ll only drain your budget, end up in debt, or drive yourself senile. In fact, as a pest specialist with a multitude of experience, I would suggest avoiding the latest craze of tools and ultrasonic pest repellants.

Only rely on the tried and tested! These advanced tools look sleek and come with an even more impressive marketing shtick, but the truth of the matter is that they simply don’t work. The same can also be said about products that have been in rotation for years, so of course, things are tricky here. Roach bombs or merely anything that blows out smoke should be avoided. The promises of such products are nice, but it’s all marketing guff.

You can’t even solely rely on the tools that visibility work. For instance, big sprays are great. You see a roach, you spray it, and it might even die instantly. That killed the intruder, right? It sure did, but you are only talking about a single roach or two. You need tools that are going to target and eliminate the entire colony. On top of this, those sprays and liquids aren’t going to penetrate deep behind the walls, where the real threat lies.

The key is to attack with a systematic plan and an active combination of proven roach-killing tools.

What Tools Work

By now, you are no doubt wondering what tools actually work. What tools would the professional pest specialist suggest for eliminating cockroaches? A vacuum cleaner with powerful suction and separate sealable waste bags would be a great start. That along with some tried and tested cleaning supplies. A crevice attachment and brush will also prove more than handy for the trying task ahead.

When selecting your cleaning solutions and chemicals, you need to be especially cautious about the fragrance. Such products might smell nice and their fragrance might send your foe running in the other direction but that’s the problem. That’s why smoke bombs aren’t that effective. They are only going to send intruders running and hiding in the other direction. If you have all exits blocked and can guarantee the intruder cannot escape such products might offer some semblance of success. Otherwise, these products will only make the situation all that much worse.

Traps are also a popular and effective option. The most popular and bragged-about are the sticky glue traps. We utilize these traps in abundance and commonly refer to them as insect monitors. They can be strategically implemented as an effective and inexpensive means to measure and track the size of the infestation. They are also good for tracking high-trafficked areas while trapping and killing several of the predators along the way.

Along with other professionals in the industry, we would highly recommend gel baits as well. Why? They work! They not only work but they offer a much more effective means to an end. They spread like a virus. They go from roach to roach, killing out cohorts that the originally infected roach comes into contact with. If you get lucky, your suspect zero might track the virus back to the colony. We like to implement what are known as insect growth regulators in conjunction with gel baits to infect multiple victims while also eliminating the roach’s ability to reproduce.

IGRs are specifically designed to interfere with the reproductive organs of the roach. They are an indispensable tool to throw in your arsenal. It would also be wise to outfit your arsenal with effective insecticide dust. While there are many brands available, most consumers can’t get their hands on the commercial grade. Look for dust that includes boric acid, borax, and diatomaceous earth (DE) for best results. These insecticides offer a slow approach, but are a tried and tested means of eradication. They work by dehydrating the unsuspecting victim.

A Systematic Attack Plan

Even an abundance of the right tools won’t offer the success you seek until you know how to properly implement them. Going from room to room, spraying cleaning, vacuuming, and placing traps isn’t the right approach. You’ll eliminate plenty of roaches along the way, but they’ll have likely rebuilt their numbers before you are done. That said when you get right down to the searching, cleaning, and removing stage of the process you’ll truly begin to see vile predators roaches are.

They feast on trash and garbage that’ll make you cringe. There are even some species that live in raw sewage. They’ll lay their eggs right in the middle of the biggest and nastiest trash pile while leaving a pheromone trail for their cohorts to follow. It is the release of these pheromones that also alert others to the desire to mate. A successful approach takes removing all this. You need to go through the home, cleaning, removing, and eliminating this gunk. When you successfully remove and eliminate this waste, you’ll want to place a trap behind. It is likely others will return to the spot even though you’ve removed the pheromones and trail, hence the utilization of the trap.

You can’t just target open areas either. If you want to be successful, you’re going to need to get behind furniture, baseboards, electrical outlets, and other various dark coves. Remember, part of the first key point was to be extremely thorough. This is the exact scenario that the statement was referring to. Be diligent about checking, monitoring, replacing, and cleaning your traps. This will allow you to monitor and determine how bad the infestation is.

Conclusion

Unfortunately, this plan of attack will not be instant. It’s not like snapping your fingers and removing your roach threat. Professionals can’t even offer those kinds of results. We can, however, make the entire situation all that much easier on you. All it takes is a single, simple phone call to our office to set up and schedule your free in-home consultation. We can work with you to devise and implement a customized, strategic battle plan. We even offer various preventive measures and approaches if you are worried about a neighbor.

Maybe you just want to talk cockroaches. That’s fine by us, as we always have willing and capable specialists standing by, ready to take your call and field your questions.

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