Where do cockroaches come from in an apartment, and why are even clean housewives not immune to the problem?

While cockroaches cause disgust, disgust, fear and a whole range of negative emotions in the average person, researchers have a genuine interest in these creatures. These are, without exaggeration, amazing insects. Just look at the following facts about cockroaches.

• They can live without a head. For about seven to ten days, until the body feels a lack of water and food, the body can act autonomously.
• They can hold their breath for up to 40 minutes. This helps them retain moisture in the body and also protect them from chemicals sprayed in the air.
• They run fast. Sensing danger, insects can reach speeds of up to 5 km/h, which is quite good for those with short legs.
• They escape expertly. To hide from its pursuer (most often from a person), a cockroach can change its trajectory up to 25 times per second.
• Virtually invulnerable. Pests don't even care about a nuclear explosion. The reason is a slow cell division cycle.

Cockroaches in the apartment: sources of the problem

To defeat the “enemy”, you need to collect as much information about him as possible. First of all, it is important to understand where cockroaches come from in an apartment and why they stay in it. The sources of the problem can be both internal and external.

Where do they come from?

The opinion that cockroaches are a sign of unsanitary conditions is only partly true. Even the cleanest housewife is not immune from such a misfortune. Typically, pests enter your home from four main sources.

1. From neighboring apartments. If the neighbors are not very clean, their “guests” may well come to you through the ventilation holes or through the entrance. Also, a mass migration of insects may begin if insects begin to be poisoned behind the wall. Covering the ventilation holes with mesh is the first thing to do if your neighbors have cockroaches.
2. From the shop. Even if the store’s sales area is clean, you cannot be sure of the sanitary condition of the warehouse premises. It is possible that a cockroach or its eggs may get into the bag along with fruits, vegetables or other products. In markets, the risk of “buying” insects is even higher.
3. From the parcel. While the parcel reaches its destination, it will visit several “transshipment points” where a cockroach can get into the package. Moreover, insects are attracted not only to food. Sometimes people receive equipment from online stores with unpleasant “bonuses”.
4. From a trip. From a trip or business trip you can bring back not only souvenirs, but also household pests. They can sneak into a suitcase in a hotel, train or plane.

With the development of international tourism, not only people, but also insects began to travel actively. This is how we can explain the increasing incidence of exotic pests appearing in domestic apartments.

Where are pests comfortable?

If cockroaches have settled in the neighborhood, this means that they are comfortable in the apartment. There are four factors that attract pests to human homes.

1. A lot of food. Cockroaches eat the same things in the house as people do. They do not require fresh and tasty products. Dried crumbs lying around in the corner are enough for them. An unclean table, unwashed dishes, a trash can, a dirty stove, an unkempt refrigerator - this is just an incomplete list of food sources for pests.
2. Free access to water. Cockroaches cannot live without water. If there is high humidity in your home, do not be surprised by the appearance of pests. Leaking pipes and taps, condensation, wet rags and sponges, flooded flower pots, wet surfaces (floor, tiles, tables) - these are the main sources of drink for cockroaches.
3. Comfortable temperature. If a person is satisfied with the microclimate of his home (not cold and not hot), then he will be satisfied with cockroaches.
4. Availability of secluded places. The more intricate the interior in terms of the amount of furniture, decor and all kinds of installation structures, the more potential places where cockroaches will live in the apartment. Pests also love to hide in cracks and crevices, which are typical of old buildings.

Interestingly, a cockroach can live for more than a month without food. Moreover, it can maintain life by feeding on paper, soap and even particles of human skin.

How to exterminate them?

Since pests usually come from neighboring residential buildings, you can limit their access to the apartment with small construction measures. Cockroaches mainly enter through cracks in doors and walls, which can be only a few millimeters wide. For safety reasons, all such entrances must be tightly closed. For preventive purposes, you can use Mashenka chalk.

All joints and cracks in walls and flooring must be sealed to prevent them from providing shelter for cockroaches. Since these insects like humid and warm climates, regularly and thoroughly ventilating the room can prevent them from taking up residence. Also, do not leave water in flower pots, sinks or buckets.

You should carefully inspect any used electrical equipment you purchase, such as washing machines, refrigerators, and even coffee machines.

When shopping, do not bring home items in used packaging, such as cardboard banana boxes, or leave them in front of the house. They may hide insects or their eggs.

After your trip, you should carefully check whether there are any stowaways in your bags and suitcases.

If the problem has already arisen and cockroaches have infested your home, take action immediately. Today you can order a variety of insect control products - cockroach pencil, gel, spray, traps or even electronic repellers.

What are they afraid of?

Despite the vitality and adaptability of pests, there are some things that cockroaches are afraid of in an apartment. There are three factors that can make your home uncomfortable for cockroaches.

1. Strong odors. Cockroaches cannot tolerate chemical odors. That's why they run away from the house during renovations. If you paint, for example, a radiator with oil paint, pests will not want to stay in the room.
2. Temperature changes. This factor can be used in the cold season, when the heating season begins. Ventilate the apartment daily for 15-30 minutes. Pests will not like frosty air.
3. Bright light. Keep the curtains open during daylight hours. Screw bright light bulbs into chandeliers and sconces.

Cockroaches cannot tolerate the aroma of essential oils. They especially dislike anise, wormwood, mint, citrus fruits and pine needles. Light an aroma lamp with your favorite ether every day to prevent unwanted proximity.

Features of pests

To remove cockroaches from a room, you need to know their behavior and characteristics well. Prussians have been living on the planet for a long time and during this time they have learned to adapt to different living conditions, including chemicals. They can easily withstand repeated treatments with toxic agents.

Such insects do not pick and choose their food, eating everything in sight. They can live for more than 30 days without food, which helps cockroaches survive in a room without food.

Our premises may be inhabited by red or black Prussians, who develop immunity to substances intended to destroy them.

Situation – the pest has eaten a toxic substance and lies motionless. The man thinks he is dead and throws him in the trash bag. And after some time, the Prussian comes to his senses and goes to the lair for further existence.

Important!

If you find the body of a dead pest, do not throw it in the trash, as it may escape, but place the carcass in the toilet. This will ensure complete removal of the parasite.

An interesting observation is that cockroaches can regulate their population indoors. Where they are subject to constant persecution, the number of individuals will not be more than 25, in other premises - several times more.

Optimal living conditions for parasites depend on several factors:

1. easy access to food
   . Prussians can eat fresh or rotten food, garbage, waste. An unwashed trash can or crumbs can feed a large number of individuals. Therefore, it is necessary to maintain constant cleanliness in the kitchen;
2. presence of water in the apartment.
   Although pests can live for a long time without food, they need to drink liquid. A small puddle or dripping faucet can serve as a source of water. It is recommended to water the flowers in the morning so that all the water has time to go into the ground;
3. room temperature and the presence of hard-to-reach places. A person needs an optimal temperature for a comfortable stay, and cockroaches also need this. Therefore, they find secluded places indoors and reproduce successfully.

How to understand that an “infiltrator” has entered the house

Just because you have not encountered pests directly does not mean that they are not in the house. Signs of the presence of cockroaches in an apartment are as follows:

• insect excrement - black spots on wallpaper, furniture, dishes;
• unpleasant odor - the appearance of an “aroma” that is not associated with the activity of domestic animals or spoilage of food;
• eggs - laying eggs in secluded corners;
• extraneous noise - faint rustling and rustling sounds at night;
• the remains are empty chitinous shells on the floor and in the cabinets.

There are many means to combat this type of pest.

List of funds:

• - aerosols, powders, creams, gels (“Combat”, “Karbofos”, “Executioner”, “Raptor”, “Blantex”, “Cobra”, etc.), you can purchase them in hardware stores, markets,
• - bait for cockroaches - boxes filled with a poisonous substance. Having tasted a portion of the poison, the cockroach transfers particles of the substance, infecting its fellows,
• - homemade traps (based on the use of sugar, boric acid, honey, vanilla).

It is important to remember that chemicals are toxic, so during treatment, people and pets need to leave the apartment for at least a couple of days, remove products and sources of water.

Even if you maintain perfect order in your apartment, this does not mean that cockroaches cannot appear in you; it is necessary to regularly treat the garbage chute, common areas, and basements. For such large-scale actions, there are special services that carry out insecticidal treatment. Today this is the most reliable means of pest control; it is better to carry out treatment not only in a single apartment, but also in neighboring ones, in the entrance, in the basement.

The “cold fog” method is very effective, especially if large areas need to be treated. As a result of its use, not only adult individuals are destroyed, but also egg laying and nests. This technology involves the dispersion of small particles of the drug, which penetrates into cracks, sockets, and under the baseboard.

We must not forget that chemical treatment can be combined with folk remedies and this will only improve the result.

Know the enemy by sight: common types

Surely, having noticed a pest running around the apartment, no one will have the desire to look at what a cockroach looks like. There will be no possibility, since the insect will run away at the speed of light as soon as it senses danger. A table that contains information about the types of cockroaches will help you recognize your enemy by sight.

Table - Types of cockroaches in the apartment

Most insects with wings fly, but cockroaches are an exception. They're more like jumping insects. When a cockroach falls from a great height, its wings help cushion its landing.

How to get rid of cockroaches in a room: their weak points

Most housewives have one reaction to the appearance of unpleasant insects; they immediately ask themselves the question: what to do if there is a cockroach in the room. Although the Prussians are good at adapting to all conditions, they have several weak points that should be taken advantage of to get rid of them.

These include:

• boric acid solution. It helps destroy various pests;
• ultrasonic repellent;
• low (more than -5 degrees Celsius) and very high temperatures contribute to the death of parasites;
• the smells of ammonia or lemon can scare away Prussians;
• kerosene.

In multi-storey buildings, all communications are interconnected, this allows cockroaches to live in any premises, but they prefer:

• toilet;
• kitchen;
• bathroom;
• balconies equipped for food storage.

Why are there so many of them: life expectancy and reproductive characteristics

If you see a lonely running cockroach and squash it with a slipper, do not rush to celebrate your victory. You won the battle, but not the war. The appearance of a lone “guest” indicates that a whole colony of pests lives somewhere in a secluded place. And they probably managed to lay eggs, from which new insects will appear after some time. To successfully fight cockroaches, you will have to take a short course in biology.

Life cycle

Cockroaches live from four months to four years, depending on external conditions. Human factors can significantly affect life expectancy. Characteristics of the life stages of insects are given in the table.

Table - Life cycle of a cockroach

There is interspecific struggle between red and black cockroaches. Prussians eat the eggs of black insects. That is why the population of the latter is growing more slowly compared to their brown counterparts.

The female as a source of danger

Cockroaches reproduce sexually. Insects undergo real mating games, during which the males begin to vigorously shake their wings and even fly low to please the female. The latter chooses the most worthy “father” for her offspring. After fertilization, she lays 15-20 eggs, which are securely stored in the protective capsule ootheca. The female carries this pouch with her everywhere for two weeks. At the last stage, the female leaves the ootheca in a secluded place, where after a few days new cockroaches hatch.

Throughout her life, the female lays an average of 20 oothecae, which is equivalent to 300-400 eggs, the survival rate of which is 90-95%. In this case, a female, fertilized once, retains the male’s genetic material in her body and can continue to reproduce independently through parthenogenesis. Thus, if you want to defeat cockroaches, you need to try to destroy the females, which can be recognized by such signs.

• Size. The female is an order of magnitude larger than the male.
• Wings. In females they are small and poorly developed.
• Head. The male has two vertical stripes on his head. Females do not have such a distinctive sign.
• Color. The male is darker than the female.
• Sexual characteristic. The female does not have a genital plate in the posterior part of the body. The easiest way to recognize a fertilized female. A “sac” containing eggs will be attached to the back of the body.

The ootheca is a reliable and dense shell that protects future cockroaches from the strongest chemicals, and even powerful radiation. It is also not easy to crush the shell. The surest way to destroy eggs is heating by treating potential laying sites with a steam generator or a hair dryer.

General information

Therefore, the favorite place of these insects is most often the kitchen. Cockroaches are mainly “night dwellers”; during the day they hide in cracks under baseboards, in kitchen cabinets, in vents, in household appliances (refrigerator, stove, dishwasher, etc.) and even in books. They do not need much space to form nests.

They can quite comfortably sit in televisions, microwave ovens, radios, where they are warm and comfortable. To get them out of there, treating them with a spray is not enough - after some time they will definitely return. You will have to disassemble the electrical appliance and clean everything from the inside.

Cockroaches are the most common household pests. They are extremely resilient and prolific - one female lays up to 12 capsules, each clutch brings 30-60 offspring.

Let's highlight the most common types of cockroaches:

• - black - live mainly in basements, lower floors of apartment buildings,
• - redheads are more unpretentious and tenacious, capable of occupying any territory,
• - sewer - the most dangerous type, they penetrate into the apartment through sewer pipes and toilets.

We fight with chemistry

The human struggle against cockroaches has a rich history, and during this time we have come up with many different means that will rid your home of them.

So, the simplest, most affordable and also safest way would be to buy boric acid , which is extremely destructive to cockroaches. It is enough just to sprinkle the powder on the approaches to the water. As you already know, cockroaches love her very much, and without her their life is doomed. Therefore, even if it only touches boric acid, the fate of the cockroach will be sealed.

He can also kill his other relatives if he comes into contact with them. But do not underestimate these creatures, as they can guess such obstacles and will try to find workarounds. In addition, powder scattered everywhere can hardly be called an apartment decoration. Many probably remember the old Soviet methods of fighting cockroaches - lumps are made , which are then laid out in places where these insects are likely to appear.

But we no longer live in the Soviet Union, and such primitive methods have been replaced by more progressive ones, namely gels, sprays, special traps and other chemicals that can be easily found in household chemical stores. Of course, all this costs money, but compared to boric acid, their effectiveness is much higher.

Microencapsulated preparations have proven themselves to be quite good, and if they are used to carefully treat the possible routes of cockroaches entering the apartment, then you can be relatively calm. Such drugs last on average for six months, and having tasted such a “delicacy”, he will die without even having time to really settle down in the new place and give birth to offspring.

But it is important not to forget - cockroaches have a tendency to adapt , and therefore they develop immunity to the action of modern means of control, which reduces the effectiveness of such drugs to zero. Therefore, it is necessary to look for new means every time.

Also, do not forget that chemicals are also dangerous for humans, especially sprays and gels. Therefore, before you take them on, you must carefully study the attached instructions for use and follow safety precautions.

What causes cockroaches to appear?

To understand why cockroaches appear, you must first establish the reason for their appearance . Without this, it will be very difficult to get rid of them, even if you resort to the advanced achievements of the chemical industry. It is also worth considering that without eliminating the cause, there is a huge risk of their re-invasion.

So, the appearance of cockroaches is accompanied by a number of factors, namely:

• having free access to garbage and food;
• leaks and condensation on pipes;
• cracks in baseboards and other hard-to-reach places;

But perhaps the main condition is unsanitary conditions, since a large amount of garbage is a real treat for cockroaches, because they will always have access to food.

Water also plays an important role. Even if a cockroach is poisoned, it can survive if it has access to water . And rare and, moreover, poor-quality cleaning will simply consolidate their population in the apartment.

The greatest attention, first of all, should be paid to the bathroom and kitchen, since cockroaches prefer these places, and you can understand that you have “uninvited guests” by the following signs:

• the presence of a rather specific and unpleasant odor;
• there may be ootheca of cockroaches near the baseboards;
• Near the stove, on the table and on the wallpaper you can find black dots - their excrement.

How to get rid of cockroaches in the bathroom

Prussians have appeared in the bathroom and you don’t know what to do? There is a solution to destroy them. You don't have to put up with nasty pests around you.

Cockroaches in the bathroom are not a problem! To get rid of pests forever, modern control methods that have proven their effectiveness are used.

These methods are:

• treating the bathroom with insecticidal aerosols;
• traps that kill insects;
• installation of poisonous baits;
• the use of poison in the form of crayons.

All these methods are effective, but if you need to get rid of pests quickly, it is recommended to use aerosol products. They ensure that the toxic substance enters the body (through the respiratory system), thereby quickly killing the cockroach.

If you cannot get rid of the annoying Prussians in your home, using all possible means, you can only resort to the last method - calling the appropriate service. They will help you get rid of pests once and for all, but for a fee.

How to get rid of cockroaches in a dorm room

It’s not easy to get rid of annoying Prussians in your own apartment, but doing it in a dorm room is even more difficult. This is due to the large number of neighbors who do not keep cleanliness well.

The main reason for the spread of insects is an uncleaned common kitchen, which no one thoroughly cleans.

Despite this, most people want to live comfortably in a dorm room without having to share their living space with nasty pests. To successfully exterminate the Prussians, you need to connect as many neighbors as possible and keep things clean.

You can use special chemicals that kill all insects.

These include:

• gels (Brownie, Global and others);
• sprays and aerosols (Get, Raptor, Cucaracha, etc.);
• traps (Taiga, Raptor, Brownie);
• fumigators.

Students most often use gels. Prussians love to eat such products because they have an attractive smell. Just a few hours after application, the insects begin to die themselves and bring poison to their relatives. This will help keep cockroaches out of your dorm room.

It is important to use gels constantly and regularly change manufacturers to avoid parasites becoming accustomed to the composition of the drug.