Roach Repellents
Peppermint oil, cedarwood oil, and cypress oil are essential oils that effectively keep cockroaches at bay. Additionally, these insects hate the smell of crushed bay leaves and steer clear of coffee grounds. If you want to try a natural way to kill them, combine powdered sugar and boric acid.
Citrus. You may love the smell of fresh citrus, but cockroaches hate the scent. That means you can use citrus scented cleaners in your kitchen and bathroom to chase any lingering roaches away. You can also keep a few citrus peels around your home in strategic places.
In the wild, these include: Amphibians like toads and frogs. Small mammals such as mice and shrews. Beetles, spiders, and other insects or arachnids.
The smell of lemons repels cockroaches to a great extent, keeping them away from areas that reek of the fruit. Hence, it is advisable to mop floors with water that has a few lemon drops in it.
Cayenne, Garlic, and Onion Powder
Walk around your home and sprinkle all cockroach-prone areas with this spice mixture. Cockroaches can't stand the smell of these spices and will avoid all areas sprinkled with them.
Tea tree oil, one of the more popular essential oils, has been said to kill roaches; however, it's completely ineffective. For starters, cockroaches are fast (so nearly impossible to hit with an essential oil spray) and they repopulate quickly (for every cockroach you kill, there are ten more in the walls).
How can I get rid of roaches fast? The best way to get rid of roaches fast is to sanitize your home, eliminate hiding spots and stagnant water, store food in airtight containers, and use glue strips, bait, boric acid, or liquid concentrates.
Baking soda and sugar
You can try this method to eliminate the producers of the eggs. In a small container (or a bottle), make a mixture of equal parts baking soda and sugar. Sprinkle it at places where you've seen cockroaches. This is one of the easiest roach killers.
The Presence Of Food
Available food is the single most powerful reason cockroaches enter our homes. These insects aren't picky eaters—almost anything left out on your kitchen counters is fair game to them, and they'll be drawn to it.
Research has found that some essential oils—especially rosemary oil—are effective at repelling roaches. Rosemary oil was found to offer a 100% roach mortality rate at the concentration range of 2.5% to 30%. So mix it with water and spray away at your problem areas!
Does Cinnamon repel cockroaches? No, cinnamon doesn't repel cockroaches. But there're are other essential oils or spices that can work against cockroaches. You can use bay leaves, garlic, and catnip to reduce some amount of cockroach activity in your home.
Lemongrass essential oil showed some effectiveness, as well as potential to eradicate German cockroaches. The experimentation suggested that it can be contact toxic and repellent against the German cockroaches, but not through the fumigation application.
It's thyme, er, time, to repel those cockroaches for good! An easy way to do this is by using the herb thyme. Thyme contains a chemical called carvacrol which roaches seem to despise. Like many of the scents on our list, thyme comes as an essential oil that you can dilute and then place in a spray.
The researchers actually determined oregano oil to be the most effective oil tested. Oregano oil repelled cockroaches up to one week after application. A 2008 study also found oregano oil to be as effective as synthetic insecticides.
Oregano essential oil is a powerful cockroach repellent that researchers found to be effective for up to a week after application.
Garlic. Roaches hate the smell of garlic to such an extent that they will practically run away from it as quickly as possible. The best way to use this is to get garlic powder and sprinkle it quite freely around the areas where there is the most evidence of cockroach activity.
The aroma of garlic has long been known to have repellent effects to many insects, including cockroaches. Garlic has a pungent smell that cockroaches don't like. Method: Crush a clove of clove garlic and place around infested areas as deterrents.
Roaches & Coffee
Roaches aren't particularly in love with coffee, but they're not known to be picky eaters either. They'll eat almost anything to get the energy and nutrients that they need to survive. So if they won't find anything else sweeter or more delectable in a cupboard, they'll definitely go for your coffee.
Not only is peppermint oil a natural cockroach repellent—it's also toxic to roaches (and for the record, to bed bugs, too).
In summary, the best plants that repel roaches and pesky insects are as follows: Basil plants, because they release a smell similar to the one created by cockroach repellent.
Whether you plant osage orange or chrysanthemums in your garden beds or keep a few strategically placed potted herbs in your kitchen, they will keep roaches away without needing renewing. You can also strategically place leaves of certain plants such as catnip in areas that attract cockroaches.
Finding a cockroach nest means finding several (or several dozen) cockroaches and, probably, a few dead ones. You'll also see plenty of roach droppings and old egg cases lying around. Cockroach droppings are tiny and look like coffee grounds or black pepper. Droppings start to collect in areas with high activity.
While Americans are mostly dormant when it's cold and rainy, summer is roach season and the critters can appear in droves. While it's sound practice all year long, in the summer it is particularly important to keep your kitchen clean, store food in airtight containers, and take out the trash on a regular basis.