In the past few decades, cockroaches have earned their crown as some of the peskiest critters. Arguably, those pests can turn into a real plague as soon as they decide to enter a home.
It takes one to do more than just spray an insecticide or put down dust or bait to get rid of cockroaches. They are likely to be found in every corner of the house and get into anything they come across.
The worst news is that with cockroaches, they multiply rapidly (just a few infestations within a day, multiply to hundreds within three days), they survive without food for a couple of months and weeks without water.
Without a doubt, cockroaches are one of the most annoying pests that can infest your home. What’s more, they can be genuinely tenacious, as they often come back even after all the sprays, baits, and cleaning. Luckily, there are more than a few ways to combat your problem.
Hopefully, this article will help you get a better understanding of the issue before you get to a cockroach control treatment. We also recommend installing insect screens to keep cockroaches and other pests out in the first place.
Common Roach Species in Singapore
German Cockroaches
Arguably, this species is one of the most common in homes. Indeed, homeowners often call them a house or apartment roaches. As expected, they prefer being indoors, where they can find food and water. Usually, they’re light brown and have a pair of black bands behind the head.
Sewer Roaches
Sewer or American roaches are more extensive than their counterparts. As the name suggests, they love hiding in damp, dirty areas. Therefore, you may often find them in planters, utility boxes or water in your yard. Of course, they might sneak into your home for food and water, especially if they’re desperate.
Typically, they’re dark brown and have yellow banding behind the head. Because of their enormous size, you can easily spot them soon after they enter your home.
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What Attracts Cockroaches to Your Home?
Water
Just like any other living form, cockroaches need water to live. Therefore, it won’t be a surprise if you find them in places where there’s plenty of the resource. For example, you may find roaches in your kitchen or bathroom because of the higher levels of moisture.
Generally, they’ll aim for just any amount of water. That’s why it’s essential to eliminate all water sources, including leaking pipes. Also, make sure you wipe up any splashed water. That way, the invaders won’t have anything to drink.
Crumbs
Secondly, food crumbs often become the main course meal for cockroaches. If that’s your mistake, then no wonder you need pest control treatment. Usually, a crumb may be enough to feed several cockroaches for a few days.
In such cases, your best shot would be to clean your home thoroughly and regularly. As you can imagine, you’ll have to make sure there are absolutely no crumbs left. The list includes places like under the stove or behind kitchen cabinets.
From then on, you can install a few bait stations here and there to eliminate the nest. By depriving the cockroaches of food sources, you’ll virtually eliminate the attraction, too.
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Holdouts
When dealing with pest control treatment and cockroaches, in particular, keep in mind that they’re quite smart. Those pesky critters can easily outsmart you by hiding in tiny gaps inside your walls. Moreover, they will use any niche of your home until the completion of the pest control treatment.
Therefore, it’s essential to seal all possible entry points. Typically, professional pest control experts will know how to deal with the issue. If you’re doing it yourself, you can start by spraying foam around pipe entrances. Ultimately, you’d want to treat all small spaces as if they’re holdouts.
Sewers and Drains
If you were wondering where roaches come from, it’s often the sewers and drains. Those places are a typical harbour for the insects, as they scale the drain pipes and climb into your home.
Of course, the only way to deal with this issue is by ensuring there’s enough water flow. Also, you can flush bleach to keep the cockroaches from returning.
Other Attractions
Surprisingly, cockroaches are enormous fans of glue. In this regard, they’d eat up the glue on the bottom of your kitchen drawers. That’s why it’s best to get rid of all adhesives, so they have no reason to come back for more.
Perhaps, another massive attraction for roaches is the temperature. As you may have noticed, warm places work like magnets for these tenacious insects. If you don’t want your home to turn into a cockroach shelter, you’d want to keep your home as cool as possible. Of course, that doesn’t mean you must sacrifice your comfort, although generally, the use of the aircon can help to cool the environment enough to prevent cockroaches.
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Read More: What Is Aircon BTU (and How To Use It To Choose an Aircon For A Specific Room)
What to Do When Roaches Keep Coming Back
If roaches keep coming back to your home, don’t panic. After all, it’s not something that you shouldn’t expect. Typically, your best shot would be to call for professional intervention. Many pest control experts will give your property a thorough inspection.
After they identify the entry points of the roaches, they’ll carry out pest control treatment in and around the house. In some cases, there may be more than one cockroach control treatment. Ultimately, they’ll make sure those pesky critters don’t come back again.
Of course, preventing potential comeback will require regular pest control treatment. Only this way you’ll be sure your home is roach-free for good.
Fortunately, many cockroach control companies offer a free consultation. Whenever you have problems with roaches in your home, you can give them a call and make a service appointment.
Cockroach Control and Why You Need to Get Rid of Cockroaches
Generally, you have no particular reason to fear cockroaches. Perhaps, the worst thing they can do is bite you, but that’s on infrequent occasions. Even if they do, they’re neither venomous nor poisonous.
However, the issue lies in the bacteria they carry. Because they live in dirty areas, they can contaminate your home. Moreover, digesting some of the bacteria can lead to symptoms similar to food poisoning, nausea, vomiting, and many more.
Worst of all, their droppings and broken shell fragments can affect people who suffer from allergies. Besides, adults and children with compromised immune systems often suffer from their impact. That’s why it’s imperative to get rid of any cockroach presence as soon as possible.
Always Call for Professional Pest Control Treatment
All in all, cockroaches can cause a lot of trouble. Perhaps, the worst part of dealing with them is that they’re resilient to most kinds of pest control treatment. Often, homeowners spray their homes just to find another ugly head rearing its head.
Therefore, it’s best to leave the task to professional cockroach control and pest control companies. They will ensure you get effective and long-lasting results. Of course, you’d want to ask for licenses and credentials before you choose to work with a company.
Ultimately, your goal is to get rid of cockroaches once and for all.
How Do You Get Rid of Cockroaches?
As you can imagine, getting rid of cockroaches is a lengthy procedure that often requires multiple treatments. Because of their highly adaptive and resilient nature, roaches are often very hard to exterminate.
In this regard, it’s essential to act quickly and timely before these pesky critters multiply. Here are some of the standard methods for pest control in events of cockroach infestations.
Perform a Thorough Cleaning
First and foremost, keeping your home clean is the easiest way to keep roaches out of your home. Since they like dirt and filth, you can start your quest by regular cleaning of crumbs and spills.
Also, you should start taking out the garbage before going to bed and seal your leftover food in containers. You must not forget to mop the floor and remove grease from the stovetop regularly.
1. Eliminate food sources
This is the most crucial cockroach control strategy. Sanitizing the kitchen and the rest of the home areas will require you to spare some quality time, hard work and dedication.
You might also have to deepen your pocket to buy the tools to use for the process. However, all these are worthy it. How happy will you be to wake up in a cockroach free space?
There is a full list of activities that you do, especially in the kitchen area of the house where the roaches love most.
- Clean all the appliances in the kitchen
- Empty the cabinets before cleaning them
- Food leftovers and all the food in the kitchen should be sealed in clean containers
- Have limitation of food consumption to only one room of the house and have the kitchen cleaned thoroughly every night before you head to bed
- Sweeping the entire house often and keeping the garbage cans emptied, rinsed and covered are the other essential activities in this method.
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2. Eliminate water sources
Yes, you should keep water near areas infested with roaches. This might be difficult, but do your best to eliminate as much as possible. How?
- Have sweating and leaking pipes fixed
- Make an attempt to clean, dry all the sinks, showers and tubs before you go to bed
- Dry all the brushes in the house and empty the refrigerator drip every evening
- Place wet sponges and dishrags in the appropriate places.
3. Harborage elimination
Cockroaches will hide during the day and choose to move around during the night (dark). This could be because there is no movement of people in the house in the dark.
Eliminating their potential hiding zones will have them come to the open in search of another hiding place.
- Seal all the crevices and cracks in the house by use of a caulking gun.
- Tightly close the door and window frames to prevent cockroaches from entering the house.
- Also, close all the holes that may surround the drainage points of the house.
Set Store-Bought Traps and Baits
After you’ve taken a step further in optimising hygiene, you can start the process of cockroach extermination. Typically, you can buy cockroach traps to bait and catch the pesky critters.
Another standard method is utilising store-bought tricks. As they use insecticides, they will quickly eliminate entire nests. Just place them near garbage cans and underneath sinks and cabinets in kitchens and bathrooms.
Use Liquid Concentrates
There are a lot of insecticides that are labelled to be used for eradicating cockroaches. These insecticides contain Cyfluthrin as the main ingredient.
All you need to do is spray it on the areas inflicted by the cockroaches, inside the cabinets where they could be hiding, or their entrance point.
Before you spray the regions, make sure that your children or pet (in case you have any), are not on the scene. To be safer, let them not be in the house when you are spraying. It is also essential to go through the instruction manual that comes with the spray and follow all the precautions.
If you want to use both the bait and spray to get rid of the roaches, avoid spraying the insecticide on the bait because the pesticide can contaminate the bait and make the cockroaches avoid the lure.
While using the spray, be aware that it only gets the roaches away temporarily. If you do not use it properly in the right places, it will only push the cockroaches to hide further and deeper in the shelves where you cannot be able to see them. This makes the problem even worse.
Make sure that you check well the area you are spraying to kill them all. Often check the place to see if they come back.
Apply Boric Acid
Last but not least, you can use universal pest control treatment – boric acid. This home remedy works well against various pests, including cockroaches. Just mix it with flour and sugar to attract the insects. However, boric acid is equally toxic to pets and humans, too. Therefore, you should use it with caution.
Can I Get Rid of Cockroaches Without Calling Pest Control?
Unfortunately, cockroaches are persistent creatures. Often, the abovementioned DIY tips aren’t practical enough. If you’ve already tried any of these steps and they haven’t helped, you probably need professional help. Indeed, a professional pest control exterminator will provide proper and thorough treatment of your home.
As DIY solutions don’t always guarantee 100% results, leaving the problem unattended can quickly turn into a disaster.
On the other hand, a professional pest control company will provide a thorough inspection with multiple treatments. Best of all, a trained and licensed exterminator will regularly check your home after the procedure. That way he’ll ensure roaches no longer come back into your property.
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How Do You Prevent a Cockroach Infestation?
Even if you manage to repel the roaches, it’s crucial to make sure they don’t come back again. In turn, there are a few strategies that will make your home less hospitable for these pesky bugs.
Get Rid of Newspapers and Cardboard Boxes
One thing that roaches adore is paper and cardboard. That’s why you can often find them around newspapers and cardboard boxes. If you happen to have excessive piles of these around your home, it’s best to move them somewhere else.
Declutter Your Home
In case you wish to keep your home roach-free, make sure you leave fewer places for the bugs to hide. In other words, you should minimise the clutter, so roaches will have to work harder to hide their presence.
Seal Cracks
Perhaps, one of the essential parts of keeping pests away from your home is sealing any cracks and crevices. Since roaches gain entry into homes by fitting through gaps, you should fill areas around windows and doors.
Moreover, you can look into the foundation or roof, attic and crawl space vents. Generally, you can use caulk to seal small holes and steel wool and foam for larger gaps. If you are not sure of how to do this alone, you can always engage reasonably-priced handyman services for help.
Read also: Different Types of Flooring Materials For Home Owners To Choose (Updated)
Perform Regular Inspection and Fix Leaks
Without a doubt, moisture is one of the main reasons homeowners have roaches in their homes. As expected, these small creatures need water just like humans. Therefore, they will welcome any water leak or plumbing issues in your home.
In this respect, it’s a bad idea to leave such issues unattended. Typically, you’d want to regularly inspect faucets, sinks, fridges, and other appliances for possible leaks or excess moisture.
Be Mindful with Food
In most cases, homeowners neglect the fact that cockroaches come into their homes looking for food. If you regularly leave an uneaten dog or cat food lying around, no wonder you have bugs in your home.
What you should do is use a dog food dispenser. Besides, you should make sure you leave no leftover food after your meals. Instead, you should seal it in containers, so roaches have no access to it.
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Schedule Regular Pest Control Inspections
Since cockroaches are a massive problem in Singapore, you should schedule regular pest control inspections. Sooner or later, you’ll have to deal with roaches in your home. Therefore, it’s best to leave the job to professional pest control services.
Hiring a pest control company will relieve you of the tedious task of fighting off these pesky critters. Moreover, a professional will quickly exterminate them for good, and you’ll be able to return to everyday life.
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