You put it in the kitchen sinks and bathroom drains, etc. for the cockroaches to flee helter-skelter. White vinegar is a known cockroach repellent. To use it, mix equal amounts of water and vinegar and sprinkle on the area where the cockroaches come out.
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.
You can give it a try by mixing equal parts apple cider vinegar and water in a spray bottle. Apply on a single roach to see what happens. You can also use apple cider vinegar as a roach repellent by spraying it around your home, especially in areas where insects are known to frequent.
If you are however living in a house with children or pets, vinegar will be the safer option to getting rid of cockroaches. All you will need to do is mix vinegar with water in a 70:30 ratio and spray it around your kitchen area. As cockroaches hate the smell of vinegar, this will help keep them away.
Boric acid Some people find this to be the best option to kill roaches. Boric acid can work too, the only downside is that sometimes roaches will go away as soon as they smell boric acid.
White vinegar is a known cockroach repellent. To use it, mix equal amounts of water and vinegar and sprinkle on the area where the cockroaches come out. This works just as well as boric acid. Hot water is probably the easiest solution on this list.
The best way to keep cockroaches away permanently is to make the home less inviting. Make sure to keep the home clean, clean up food messes, take out trash at the end of the day, seal any cracks or gaps around windows, doors and the foundation, and fix any issue that might lead to high moisture content within the home.
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.
Sprinkle boric acid in areas the roaches frequent; when they walk through it, it sticks to them. They later ingest the boric acid, which then kills them. When using boric acid, be sure to limit your exposure; don't place it anywhere that children or pets might find it, as it's toxic when ingested.
Home remedies like diatomaceous earth, baking soda, boric acid, citrus, essential oils, and borax can be effective ways to get rid of roaches. If you want to take a more aggressive approach to eliminate roaches, glue traps, bait stations, and liquid roach deterrent concentrates are all excellent options.
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.
Acetic acid makes vinegar an excellent tool for pest control, repelling some of the most common backyard nuisances and even killing weaker insects. It's most effective against ants, spiders, and mosquitos. You can keep spiders from entering your home by spraying vinegar around your property's perimeter and entryways.
Taking a deep drink of household bleach would kill anything, roaches included. But the same strong odor that keeps people from taking a swig of bleach repels roaches as well. So though it could work, in reality, it will not. It is very difficult to kill an entire roach infestation yourself.
Your best bet is to combine baking soda with another granulated attractant, like sugar. Mix equal parts baking soda and sugar in a small dish and apply it to kitchen cabinets, baseboards, crevices, water sources, and other places roaches like to hide.
Use Boric Acid
Boric acid remains one of the most popular and effective methods for combatting a roach infestation.
Windex is toxic to most pests, especially spiders. Spraying window cleaner directly onto small insects like ants or mosquitoes will kill them within a few moments. For cockroaches, window cleaner can make them temporarily unconscious so that you can squash them.
Left out food, waste, garbage, clutter, moisture, heat, and darkness are all things that attract roaches. As you might expect, this means they're most likely to be found in areas like kitchens, basements, and cluttered or dirty areas. But—you don't have to have a dirty home to have cockroaches.
Good old-fashioned soap and water is a safe, reliable, and inexpensive method. Create a soapy water solution that you can spray with a bottle. It will only take about 2 – 3 sprays to kill any roaches, as the soapy solution will cover their breathing pores and suffocate them.
Certain essential oils, such as peppermint oil, tea tree oil, and eucalyptus oil, have strong insecticidal properties and can repel or kill cockroaches. Mix a few drops of these oils with water in a spray bottle and apply it directly to the pests or in their hiding spots.
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.
Cockroach predators include mammals, avians, amphibians and other reptiles. For example, hedgehogs will eat roaches. Joining the roach à la mode dinner party are geckos, skinks and other species of lizards, frogs, turtles, some types of birds and even rats and mice.
Seal the Entrances
They enter homes through cracks and crevices in doors, windows, and foundations. The best tip for how to keep roaches away is to avoid an infestation by preventing the bugs from coming inside in the first place. Close gaps around windows and doors with weatherstripping and seal up cracks with caulk.