No one wants the silent surprise of a cockroach infestation. Unfortunately, the creepy insects find their way into homes and apartments, where they make nests, reproduce, and spread diseases. Getting rid of cockroaches can be challenging, especially if they’ve infested an area for a long time.
Hire an exterminator
The best way to remove a cockroach infestation is by hiring a Boston exterminator. They have the tools and skills to get cockroaches out of your home and know how to keep them from returning.
Experienced exterminators understand the challenges of taking care of insect infestations in the Boston area. The older homes and communities in the area have unique features that give cockroaches plenty of hiding places and access to food, water, and shelter.
Seal your home from further infestations
Prevention is the best way to get rid of cockroaches in your home. First, walk around your home and look closely at the foundation. If you see cracks and crevices, consider filling them with caulk to prevent insects from entering.
You can also make your home less attractive to roaches by removing landscaping features from around your home. Cockroaches can hide in plants, bushes, and mulch that butts up to your home. After they find shelter in the plant material next to your home, they eventually enter your home.
Clean up your interior
Cockroaches have simple needs: food, water, and shelter. Human homes provide all three, especially if they have crumbs and standing water. You can make your home less attractive to cockroaches by cleaning up spills and crumbs in your kitchen. If you have standing water in your basement or crawl space, remove it and find a way to prevent it from recurring.
The pesky insects also like clutter, especially newspapers, cardboard, and piles of clothing. So remove potential nesting areas and clean your home so roaches cannot find shelter.
Use safe roach-killing substances
Exterminators use proprietary insecticides to remove roaches. However, if you have pets and young children, you might want to try a safe, natural roach killer.
You can remove small infestations using baking soda, boric acid, borax, glue traps, and dish soap. For example, mix some baking soda with sugar and place it near their nests. The roaches will eat the food, and the baking soda will make their stomachs burst. Boric acid sticks to their feet and kills them, while the borax kills them by dehydrating them.
Roaches like the sweetness of glue traps but cannot get off them. Dish soap clogs their pores, so they cannot breathe.
Place bait stations around your home’s exterior
You can kill roaches with bait stations near exterior entry points. Bait stations have poison inside them, which the roaches take from the station and bring into their nests. Putting the bait outside keeps roaches from entering your home.
Wrap up
When you clean your home, roaches won’t have a reason to enter. However, if they do, exterminators can help you remove them and show you how to prevent their reentry.
