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Q: Any advice about dealing with cockroaches?
Moved into a first floor flat (second floor if you're Chinese) when the wife was pregnant, and it has a bigger roach problem than i've had to deal with before. Last night we had a major 'sweep and clear' roach cleansing, but i'm dubious as to whether we've solved the problem. Saw one climbing the walls the size of a Dachshund. The dog, not the car, that's a Datsun, although I think this thing was big enough to drive a Datsun. Huge legs on it - even thought I saw a tattoo of the word 'Butch' on one of them.
So what tips do you have to avoid another infestation? I had a friend tell me not to stomp them, as if you get a pregnant one you could unwittingly cause an infestation yourself. Keeping the place clean is of course important, but like they say, 'experience is what we get just five minutes after we need it' so if I can learn from yours, i'd be most grapefruit.
11 years 20 weeks ago in Health & Safety - China
You could get a bunch of cats and not feed them. They will attack anything that moves or you move to a roach free apartment.
Judging by the humor in your question, you should put on a comedy show for them. You absolutely killed.
mArtiAn:
Ok, maybe i'll give it a try. Ooh, i'll open with the one about the three nuns in the bath, that always gets 'em. I'm actually kind of nervous.
t91camp:
Now I'm imagining a Joe's Apartment-meets-Monty Python scenario...and it is majestic.
I just buy all the roach products available and just go to war. The poison tray things you can buy are good. I usually buy a few boxes of those and put them everywhere; under the sink, under the fridge, in certain corners. That way you usually find a few dead in the mornings. Then off course there's the spray for when you come across one running.
That's about all you can do. Buy the poison traps and put them all over. Then buy the napalm in a can and spray the F out of any you see.
I read in an article which says the smell of onion will drive cockroaches away.So,you can buy some onions ,cut them into slices and put them in the house,tell me if it works.
Use a simple solution of soap and water. This, to some, is the easiest thing to do. Just make a light solution of soap (bath soap is fine) and water. You can splash this, spray this or just throw this on the roach. Just a little water will do, even 2 or 3 drops can kill, if used effectively. Ensure that it makes contact with the roaches head and lower abdomen (its belly if you can turn the roach over). The roach will run or try to run, but will suddenly stop and die or be almost dead in one minute. It is best to throw it out as soon as possible, as it may revive. This happens because the roach breathes through its skin. The soapy water forms a thin film on the breathing pores, and effectively blocks them (surface tension), causing the roach to suffocate to death or to near death, although it could recover if the water dries up or has not touched a large percentage of its body.
Feed them,
- One part powdered (not granular) boric acid (sometimes sold as a roach-killing powder, but often available in pharmacies (for making anti-pinkeye eyewash), one part white flour, one part granulated white sugar. The sugar baits it, the flour makes it stick, and the boric acid kills them. Place in the backs of drawers and cabinets, under refrigerator, stove, etc. Expect at least 3 cycles of disappearance/reemergence of progressively smaller hordes of cockroaches, lasting about 2 weeks each. Continue using boric acid till roaches are gone.
- Kids, dogs, and some other pets will eat this mixture. Boric acid is not highly toxic, but is for external use ONLY, so place it where only the bugs can get it. It will cake hard in humid environments, so paper or foil trays may be needed.
It's better that you feed them something that will kill them later or something they will drag off into their nest. If they die in your apartment, you will have to spend all your time drawing chalk marks around the bodies.
mArtiAn:
Make sure it makes contact with the head and abdomen? Turn them over and get it on the belly? I want to kill these fu***rs, not give them an all-over body massage.Cheers though.
Relt:
just an fyi: the water and soap trick also works with other nasty bugs... like spiders.
mArtiAn:
I didn't miss it as much as avoid it for reasons of personal safety Ted. Operation 'Clean Sweep' is going well though, you'll be glad to know, although I got back late last night and there were a large gathering of them below my kitchen window, one of which seemed to be holding a small stick that he was pointing at a dust drawing on the floor. Even thought I heard the words 0-200 hours as I climbed the stairs. 'Twas an uneasy sleep for me last night.
TedDBayer:
You should be glad China does not have PETA chapters, http://www.peta.org/living/home-and-garden/Be-Kind-to-Cockroaches.aspx
Use a cup of flat beer. Roaches love it. Get a cup with smooth sides and let it sit out at night. Make sure the roaches will be able to get in. The roaches will fall into the beer, thinking it's super delicious and drown horribly in the beer. No idea why it works but I've seen people clear out whole clans of roaches in a few days.
Use the roach traps, wash dishes immediately, and avoid clutter.
mArtiAn:
Just what I need a flat-full of drunken cockroaches. I'll give it a try though, cheers.
mArtiAn:
Well I tried it last night and they did. They drank the bleeding lot. Not a single one of them in sight though and now my cigarettes are missing.
beaufortninja:
Use a cup with smooth straight sides yo. Preferably glass and put just enough beer so that they will have to swim but can't climb out.
Spray works the best for me to contain them. Raid is tried and trusted to me. Spray in every corner and dark spot in the house, even inside empty desk drawers, around drains and under the shoe racks. It won't 100% eliminate all of them, but 1 stray roach every couple weeks is better than 2 to 20 a day.
Also, eliminate good hiding spots. Moist humid dark cabinets filled with cleaners and junk, dirty floors covered in trash water, hair and dust, under the bed keep the walls clear so there is an obvious path you can see if you get down no your knees. They like tight dark "rooms" where nobody can see a thing without pushing the plastic tote out of the way.
Also, using the spray will also slaughter flies and mosquitos and other weird critters, so it has many uses.
Give them sugar and water you meatbag.
mArtiAn:
I should give 'you' sugar and water, who you callin' meatbag?
bill8899:
Listen here monkey boy! Compared to you humans I'm on the top rung of the evolutionary ladder! So be quiet!
since everything is fake wood, concrete here , i buy a small bag of bathtile grout and mix and seal every crack in the house, probably looks like crap if you dont know to grout well, pack and wipe with wet cloth after filling in the cracks. then bug bomb the hell out of the place.
Here I what I did and it worked quickly:
Mix a small amount of borax or baking soda, with brown sugar and flour.
Sprinkle behind and around appliances and under sink.
The cockroaches will carry that mixture back to their nests.
BBQ!!!!!!!
mArtiAn:
You're joking but my wife did just that as a child. THAT is hunger. Although with a little thousand islands, who knows.....they might not taste half bad.
this would be a racist answer. it is not my answer , but this would be a racist answer. "invite your neighbors to a 'catch your own' dinner"
if sb gave that answer they should be voted off the board.
First and second floor apartments are prone to cockroaches in China. Go to your neighborhood market and buy some cockroach smoke generators( HUALI). At night place a few generators on the floor outside the bedrooms, seal up the bedroom doors and light the generators. In the morning sweep up all the dead cockroaches, you may be surprised how many. Do the reverse in the daytime. Put generators in the bedrooms and seal the doors to the bedrooms. After the fumigations air out you rooms. All you roaches are gone.Franck3
mArtiAn:
In this area a smoke generator outside our bedroom window would be gone in sixty seconds.
If they are around the sink, I pour boiling water on them
Other small ones are caught in a tissue and flushed away
Big ones will just be bashed to death, but only enough so that they can't move. Not to the point that their babies are spread out on the floor etc.
See Miss A and Woody
Nobody will support you guys in state of Origin LOL
Go the QLD Cane Toads