Keeping your home safe, sanitary and pest free is very important. Here at TermMax Pest Control, we are very serious about taking care of all of your issues. Keeping a clean home helps to keep your family disease free and healthy. One particular area where you could be attacked by pests, is in your pantry areas. Your pantry, kitchen and other food storage areas are always susceptible to pantry pests. The cockroach is one of the most ubiquitous pantry pests. It’s so important to keep your family safe from these insects. Today we’ll talk about the cockroach and what you can do to protect yourself and your family.
ALL ABOUT COCKROACHES
Cockroaches can be found around the world. They have used our shipping lanes to transport themselves to all continents with the exception of Antarctica. They are a tropical pest. Because of this, they require higher temperatures than many other insects that you will find naturally in your area. Cockroaches will find themselves inside homes and businesses and anywhere you can find food. They enjoy our heat and air conditioning and do so while eating and contaminating our food.
One of the biggest deterrents that you can do to keep cockroaches from making themselves home in your home, is to keep a clean and clutter fleet free house. Without clutter, cockroaches can’t find a place to stay and hide. Because they are small insects that are at the bottom of the food chain, cockroaches will try to scurry away and hide. By keeping the clutter down, this keeps them from being able to find hiding places in and amongst your things. There’s always a place that they can go, but keeping those places to a minimum is very important. Call your Broken Arrow pest control company for help.
HUNTING THE COCKROACH
Cockroaches essentially need three things in order to set up shop and start an infestation. They need harborage, food and water. As we just spoke about, harborage is important to keep to an all the time minimum if possible. Cockroaches finding food is also an issue. Cockroaches will find a way into any pantry or food area that they can find. In most cases, refrigerated areas are fairly safe. Cockroaches require warmer temperatures, so going into refrigerators will be deterred. One way of keeping cockroaches out of your dry goods, is to put things inside of plastic, sealable containers. These kinds of containers can keep cockroaches out. Roaches can find a way into plastic bags by chewing through them. And they will rip through any sort of paper bag if they find.
Cleaning dishes and taking care of uneaten food is very important as well. Cockroaches will find the things that they can feed on and continue to survive. Water is another thing that they require for sustenance. If you’re having any kind of plumbing issues, it’s important to take care of them quickly. Not only can those plumbing issues provide water for these insects to survive on, but there are other species that are predominately found in our drainage and sewage systems that can make their way in if drainage piping is broken or open. Your Broken Arrow exterminator can help you with cockroach issues.
DEALING WITH COCKROACHES
One of the methods that cockroaches use to protect themselves against predators, is their ability to reproduce extremely quickly. A single pair of cockroaches can turn into thousands in a matter of weeks. It’s important that if you’re going to take care of these insects, that you get rid of every single one of them. One of the worst ways of doing this is to use over-the-counter pesticides. Many over-the-counter pesticides are labeled to take care of roaches. The problem with them, is that they are repellent type pesticides. That means that insects such as roaches can sense these pesticides, and it causes them to fear them and scurry away.
Spraying them all over the place, like most people do, will force roaches to go somewhere where they can no longer sense the pesticide. In most cases this is going to be some place you can’t get to such as inside a wall, or behind a kitchen cupboard or appliance. Here they will stay and wait until the pesticide that you sprayed wear’s out and goes away. During that time, they will continue to reproduce and grow in number. So when the entire process is done, you will end up having more cockroaches to deal with then if you would’ve just not sprayed the spray to begin with. If you’re having an issue with cockroaches or any other pantry pest, it’s important to call your Tulsa exterminator. They’re going to have the right pesticides and the know how to be able to eliminate your cockroach issues quickly and completely.
SPECIES OF ROACH
In Oklahoma, cockroaches come in four different species. The most often seen cockroach is the German cockroach. This cockroach is smaller, but very quick at reproducing. They are commonly seen in kitchens, pantries and restaurants all over the state. In fact, they’re found all over the country. The second that you often see are the brown banded cockroaches. These cockroaches have a light yellow band around their midsection and are brown in color. They often take residence higher up on the wall or in the attic.
The American cockroach is the largest cockroach usually seen in homes. It almost always is found in sewers and drainage ditches. The only time you usually see American cockroaches is when you have a plumbing issue and they are making their way through the pipes into your home. The last cockroaches is the oriental cockroach. It’s black in color, and is found mostly in drainage ditches and sewer systems. It doesn’t actually eat our food, but it will find its way inside and use our homes and businesses for harborage.
ELIMINATING COCKROACHES FOR GOOD
If you’re having an issue with cockroaches or any other pest, it’s time to call and a professional Tulsa pest control company. Here at TermMax Pest Control, we’re the best in the business. We service the greater Tulsa area including Owasso, Sand Springs, Sapulpa, Prattville, Broken Arrow, Jenks, Bixby, Coweta, Claremore, Catoosa and much more. Call us today for a free estimate. We’re here to help!
