Wise Tips to Know to Keep Your Home Cockroach Free

The sunny days of summer are here! Time to soak up the sunshine, relax with loved ones, and make happy memories.

But those cockroaches often show up uninvited, ready to crash your summer fun. We feel your frustration when these unwelcome critters scuttle through your home.

Here’s our insider tips to make your home as cockroach-free as possible.

You Need to Seal Up Entry Points

Cockroaches are champion infiltrators. They can slide their flat bodies through astonishingly small cracks and openings. Once inside, they quickly make themselves at home in the dark, hidden spaces of your house.

To thwart these pests, the Environmental Protection Agency recommends sealing up any possible entryways into your home. Here’s what to do:

• Inspect the foundation, walls, windows, doors, and other areas carefully for gaps and cracks. Even hairline spaces allow roaches to sneak their way in.
• Use caulk or expandable foam sealant to plug up any crevices you uncover during your inspection. This blocks access for roaches trying to enter from outdoors.
• Make sure utility entry points where cables, pipes, and wires come indoors are completely sealed. Roaches often follow these indoors.
• Check that outdoor vents are covered with secure screens. Roaches can climb through the louvers if they aren’t protected.

Sealing off entry points is crucial to shutting down roaches’ routes into your house. With their secret passageways blocked, it’s much harder for them to get inside.

You Must Keep Your Home Clean and Dry

Cockroaches thrive in filthy conditions and need water to survive. By keeping your home tidy and moisture-free, you take away what sustains them. Here’s what to do:

• Store all food inside sealed containers made of glass or hard plastic. Tight lids prevent roaches from getting inside.
• After cooking and eating, immediately clean up food scraps, crumbs, and spills. Roaches quickly gather to feast on these remnants.
• Remove trash from your kitchen each evening. Use a garbage can with a tight fitting lid so roaches can’t climb inside.
• Fix any leaky pipes or faucets right away. Don’t leave standing water in sinks, tubs, buckets or pans that roaches might drink from.
• Keep kitchen appliances freshly cleaned, especially behind and underneath them. Food debris often collects in these spots, attracting roaches.

Research shows that maintaining clean, dry living spaces significantly decreases roaches and related allergies. You’ll be amazed what a difference it makes!

Natural Repellents Can Help Deter Roaches

If you want a non-toxic way to drive roaches out of your home, natural repellents are a good option.

Give these solutions a try:

• Make a simple spray by adding several drops of peppermint, eucalyptus or lavender essential oil to water in a spray bottle. Mist it in places where roaches lurk to deter them with the strong scent.
• Sprinkle boric acid powder lightly in out-of-sight areas where you’ve spotted roach activity. When used properly, boric acid is toxic to roaches but harmless to humans and pets.
• Plant bay leaves around your kitchen. Roaches strongly dislike the fragrance of these dried leaves.

Keep in mind natural repellents may not be as powerful for large infestations as professional grade treatments. But they can be helpful additions to your prevention plan.

Use Traps and Baits to Control Roaches

Traps and baits are time-tested tools for revealing and eliminating household roaches. Here’s how to put them to work:

• Place sticky traps in areas where you’ve glimpsed roaches. They’ll get stuck to the trays, allowing you to pinpoint zones of activity.
• Bait stations containing insecticide work well in heavy roach territory. Roaches take the bait back to their nests, killing entire colonies.
• The National Pest Management Association recommends combining both trapping and baiting rather than relying on just one tactic. Attack roaches from multiple angles for better results.

Call the Pros for the Best Roach Control

For the most effective defense against roaches, you need the professionals on your side! Why? A few great reasons:

• Exterminators have industrial-strength insecticides that thoroughly kill roaches and destroy their nesting areas.
• They use advanced treatment methods and precision tools home users don’t have access to. This allows them to eliminate roaches in ways you can’t on your own.
• Professional pest control technicians are experts at finding every last roach hiding place. They stop at nothing to hunt down these pests and get them out of your house.

At Parker Pest Control, our skilled roach exterminators have the cutting-edge products and practices to free your home from roaches.

Let us handle these invaders so you can relax and enjoy your summer!