Borax is a readily-available laundry product that's excellent for killing roaches. For best results, combine equal parts borax and white table sugar. Dust the mixture any place you've seen roach activity. When the roaches consume the borax, it will dehydrate them and kill them rapidly.
The poison in roach bait stations, killing bait strips, and killing gels takes about 24-hours to kill roaches that eat it. The critters live long enough to carry the bait back to the colony and share it with their nest mates.
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.
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.
Boric acid: Used correctly, boric acid is one of the most effective roach killers. It's odorless, has low toxicity to pets, and since it isn't repellent to roaches, they will not seek to avoid it, crawling through it repeatedly until it kills them.
A spray bottle mixed with three parts fabric softener and two parts water can be an effective way of eliminating cockroaches. The chemicals within the fabric softener suffocate the roaches. This method only works if the cockroaches come into direct contact with the mixture.
A concoction of baking soda and sugar is an effective cockroach killer and controls the multiplication of these pests. Sugar acts as a bait to attract cockroaches and the baking soda kills them. You just need to identify their hideouts and sprinkle this mixture in those corners.
Besides leaving behind numerous cockroaches, bug bombs also leave behind nasty toxic residue in the middle of floors and countertops. Total release foggers, commonly known as "bug bombs," are ineffective at removing cockroaches from indoor environments, according to a new study from North Carolina State University.
Roaches don't like the scent of mothballs, making them an effective pest repellent. Mothballs can only keep cockroaches away for a year or two since the pests adjust quickly and easily to new environments.
Add some food like a small piece of meat or some sweet stuff like chocolate on the roach bait in the bowl. Keep the bowl near one of the hiding places of roaches. To cover all the hiding places, you'll need multiple bowls with sticky roach trap and food. The smell of the food will draw the roaches out.
Moisture. Roaches need moisture to survive and this search for water will bring them into even the cleanest of homes. Leaky pipes and faucets are one of the most common attractants for cockroaches and is one of the main reasons you often see them in bathrooms, kitchens, and laundry rooms.
Cockroaches enter bathrooms by crawling up through drains, finding gaps in baseboards, squeezing through leaky pipes, sliding under doors, and through small holes in walls or ceilings. Sometimes, cockroaches enter through other parts of the house and travel to the bathroom, attracted by the water and humidity.
Do Cockroaches Like the Cold? Generally, cockroaches don't like the cold one bit. They are cold-blooded arthropods that don't survive very well in either extremely cold or hot circumstances. They're always at whatever temperature their environment is and generally slow down with cooler temperatures.
The most common places for a roach nest in the house are in kitchens or bathrooms, particularly behind refrigerators, in cracks and crevices, and under furniture. Roaches prefer a warm, humid environment, so these places should be considered first, especially if they are close to a food source and water supply.
It's a fact that cockroaches are afraid of humans and other mammals or animals that are bigger than them. They see us as predators and that fear triggers their instinct to scatter away. However, they dislike strong and distinctive scents such as citrus, peppermint, lavender and vinegar.
The bedroom is full of dead skin and hair that many people often overlook. Underneath dressers and inside closets are popular hiding spots for roaches, as it offers shelter and food – as long as you don't clean those places.
Distilled vinegar does not kill or repel roaches, making it completely ineffective. Distilled vinegar will help keep your kitchen clean, giving cockroaches less to snack on. However, roaches can live for months at a time without any food at all, and they will eat almost anything to survive.
Cleaning surfaces with ammonia, however, will deter the roaches all the more so mixing 2 cups of ammonia with a bucket of water and using this as a cleaning solution will help deter the cockroaches away.
Cockroaches hate black pepper. Its spiciness drives them nuts.
First things first, don't panic! It takes about two weeks for all the roaches to be flushed out. Severe infestations might even require a second treatment. But your exterminator should let you know if this is needed.
You can combine flour and boric acid with a substance that will attract roaches—such as sugar—to make a roach-killing recipe. Boric acid is a strong compound so be careful to handle it according to its package instructions. You can also try non-chemical traps or even try repelling roaches using sound waves.