When you live in a place that many people consider paradise, you quickly become aware of both the good and bad aspects of your home. There’s no doubt about it: Oahu is a stunning place, and there are many benefits to living in our tropical climate. However, it’s not entirely perfect here.
Because our warm weather lasts through all 12 months, pests thrive in Oahu year-round. This can be annoying, damaging to our property, or bad for our health, depending on the pests that try to move into our homes. One pest that we have to look out for is the cockroach. Cockroaches are pests that are bad news for any Oahu home. Knowing how to prevent cockroaches from getting into your home and knowing what to do for cockroach control in Oahu if they do find their way inside is vital.
PTH’s comprehensive guide to cockroach control provides all of the information you need when it comes to cockroaches. Find out how to identify the common species in Oahu, learn what problems cockroaches are known to cause when they get into area homes, see why professional cockroach control is the best choice to eliminate an infestation, and find out how to avoid a new infestation with our simple prevention tips.
Types Of Cockroaches: Identifying Common Species
There are quite a few different species of cockroaches in the world. Different regions deal with different species, so knowing which ones to look out for when you’re in Oahu can help you more quickly and accurately identify a cockroach problem in your house.
Two different types of cockroaches are active in Oahu, and both can be a major problem for homeowners. Those two cockroach species are German cockroaches and American cockroaches. These roaches share some similarities, but they are also quite different from each other. Knowing how to identify both of them starts by knowing what they look like.
German cockroaches are the most common type of cockroach in the United States. These pests are small, only growing to about half an inch in length. They have oval-shaped bodies that are light brown or tan in color. On their backs, just behind their heads, they have two darker brown stripes. German cockroaches have six legs, with each pair getting slightly larger as you move from front to back. They have two long, thin antennae. German cockroaches also have wings, but they don’t typically use them for flight, preferring to run from place to place instead.
American cockroaches are much bigger than German cockroaches. The smallest adults measure in at over an inch, and they can grow to over two inches in length. Reddish-brown in color, American cockroaches have a yellowish figure-eight pattern on their heads. Like German cockroaches, American cockroaches have six legs that get progressively larger from front to back and a pair of long, thin antennae. They also have wings, but unlike German cockroaches, they do use them to fly short distances. American cockroaches are also called palmetto bugs, Bombay canaries, and water bugs.
Both German cockroaches and American cockroaches prefer to spend their time in warm, dark, humid areas. When they get into your home, they are most likely to be found in the kitchen, bathroom, laundry room, or basement. While American cockroaches tend to move indoors when they can’t find food outside or when there is a big change in the weather, German cockroaches prefer to live in indoor locations and aren’t often found living outdoors.
Health Risks And Property Damage: The Hazards Of Cockroaches
Cockroaches have gotten a bad reputation over the years, and they have earned it. These bugs aren’t like many other nuisance pests that get into homes and are nothing but an annoyance. In fact, cockroaches are one of the most dangerous pests to end up with in your Oahu home, mainly because of the health risks they introduce.
What diseases do cockroaches carry? There are dozens of them. Studies have shown that cockroaches have been found to carry over 30 different types of bacteria on their bodies. That doesn’t include other types of pathogens or parasites. Some of the diseases cockroaches spread are likely familiar to you, while there are others that you may not have heard of. Gastroenteritis, salmonellosis, E. coli infection, typhoid fever, and cholera are all diseases that you have probably heard of that are spread by cockroaches.
How do cockroaches spread all of these dangerous illnesses? It has to do with their habits and behaviors. Cockroaches like to spend their time in dark, secluded areas with high humidity. When outdoors, you may find them in garbage bins, dumpsters, or sewers. When inside, they often take up residence in sink drains or under sinks in kitchens and bathrooms.
While in these unsanitary places, it’s easy for cockroaches to pick up pathogens on their bodies. Once they start moving around, these pathogens will end up on the surfaces they touch as they move. If cockroaches are in your house, it’s only a matter of time before they contaminate your kitchen counters and cupboards or your bathroom sink or counter. The next time you prepare a meal on your countertop or set your toothbrush down beside your sink, you put yourself and your family at risk of coming into contact with those pathogens.
Cockroaches are also a threat to your respiratory health. The shed skins, saliva, and waste products of cockroaches trigger allergy and asthma symptoms in many people. If cockroaches are in your house, you may end up dealing with those health issues as well.
Eradicate A Cockroach Problem In Your Home: Call In The Experts!
Cockroaches are nocturnal pests, so if they get into your house, you might not realize it right away. They prefer to hide during the day and will come out at night to feed. Identifying a cockroach infestation in its early stages requires you to be looking for it. Check in out-of-the-way areas to look for roaches or their droppings. Check areas at night to see if you can spot any activity.
With a more well-established infestation, it will become much more obvious that cockroaches are present. Cockroaches breed fairly quickly, so once a large population is in your house, their hiding spots become overcrowded, and cockroaches will be more likely to be active during the day, making them easier to spot.
Whether your infestation is big or small, you don’t want to wait an extra moment to start working to eradicate the issue. Cockroach pest control in Oahu should always be tackled by experts. Cockroaches are not easy pests to get rid of, which makes do-it-yourself cockroach control methods only mildly effective. Furthermore, getting at the root of a cockroach problem is often difficult for homeowners because cockroaches are good at hiding in areas that are difficult to access.
With PTH, you can be certain that your cockroach problem will be handled with care to ensure its full eradication. We tailor our services to your home’s particular needs so that you get the specific cockroach control methods necessary to eliminate every last cockroach in your Oahu home.
Maintenance Tips: Ensuring Long-Term Cockroach Control
Whether you’ve had cockroaches in your home that you recently got rid of or you’ve never had a cockroach infestation, you want to do everything you can to make sure that cockroaches never get into your Oahu home in the future. Thankfully, there are quite a few things you can do to prevent cockroaches from getting into your home. Knowing how to prevent cockroaches in Oahu comes down to understanding what cockroaches are attracted to and making sure those things are not present in or around your home. Use the following suggestions to help keep your home cockroach-free:
Eliminate as much moisture around the outside of your house as possible. Remove standing water, fix drippy spigots, unclog gutters, cut back foliage to dry up moisture around your foundation, and make sure your drainage system works properly.
Keep your outdoor garbage bins stored away from your house, and make sure they have secure lids attached.
Seal all cracks and crevices around your house. Repair gaps around windows and doors. Place screens over vents.
Inside, make sure humidity levels stay low in all rooms, especially the kitchen, bathroom, and basement.
Store all food in airtight containers. Do not leave food out on the counters.
After each meal, clean up dishes, counters, and the sink.
Sweep your floors often.
Clean up spills, crumbs, and other messes as soon as they happen.
Remove your trash regularly. Don’t let it pile up.
By following the recommendations above, you can help prevent cockroaches from getting into your Oahu home. If you do find cockroaches in your house, cockroach pest control from PTH will safely and efficiently solve the problem. Let the experts at PTH use our decades of combined home pest control experience to ensure your home is cockroach-free.
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