Pretty much everyone hates roaches, and they are probably the last thing you want to see running across your kitchen counters, so in this post, we cover the top warning signs you have cockroaches in your home.
Seeing Roach Droppings
First off, roaches are nocturnal and are very skittish when it comes to being around humans, so you’ll probably have a hard time noticing them if there’s only one or two roaches hiding in your home. You might accidentally run into them as you are stumbling into the dark kitchen for a late night snack as you open the fridge door.
Cockroaches, like most pests, are in constant search of food, water, and shelter. Unfortunately, your home can be an excellent provider of all three things cockroaches are looking for to survive.
Roaches typically eat food you leave easy access to such as scraps in garbage cans or even grease and grime left behind on dirty appliances and counters. You’ll usually find them hanging around in the kitchen or bathrooms where there are many access points for food and water.
In these high traffic areas for roaches, a top warning sign you have cockroaches in your home is finding roach droppings in these areas. Unless you are a night owl like roaches, you’ll probably start finding roach droppings before you start seeing other warning signs of cockroaches.
You’ll start finding egg casings (oothecae)
It doesn’t take long for a few roaches to create a massive problem because these pests can breed incredibly fast. Roaches don’t just lay one egg at a time and call it a day, but instead they lay cases of eggs, (called Oothecae).
These long brown egg cases can contain an average of 10 to 20 eggs and in some species of cockroach that egg count could jump up to as high as 50 eggs per case. This means a few roaches can quickly multiply when left unchecked and become a major issue almost overnight.
As we talked about earlier, roaches are nocturnal and skittish with human interactions, so usually you might find these egg cases before you start to see actual roaches around your home. Finding these egg casings is bad news, and if they haven’t yet hatched you’ll need to take immediate action before they do or you might quickly have hundreds of roaches in your home.
Often roaches will hide these egg casings in hard to reach places, making them hard to find and treat with over-the-counter remedies. This is one reason we recommend reaching out to a pest control service for treatment if you start seeing any of these top warning signs for cockroaches.
Smelling roaches
Another warning sign for roaches you might encounter before you start actively seeing them is you will start smelling them. Roaches can produce a rather unpleasant musty order throughout your house.
This is caused for several reasons. This smell could come from decaying dead roaches, but also from several live roaches as well. Often if you are smelling roaches, it will have an oily and musty smell.
In most cases when you begin smelling roaches, it’s probably not just from a single roach. Occasionally, certain species of roaches do have a potent smell as an individual roach, but in most cases you’ll be smelling many roaches if it’s strong enough to detect throughout your home.
Dead Roaches
Spotting dead roaches throughout your home is another sure warning sign you have roaches in your home. Roaches are a tough breed of pest and can go long periods without food, and in some cases even without a head!
Surprisingly, roaches can breath though tiny holes along their bodies and headless roaches can still survive for a decent amount of time. The only reason these headless pests die, is they can no longer ingest food or water.
This means that if you are finding dead roaches hidden around your home, they were the weaker ones that couldn’t survive. In most cases there are still plenty of others hiding throughout your home when you start finding roach carcasses.
Also finding dead roaches doesn’t mean you are in the clear. It’s usually just a sign that numbers are increasing and the issue may only be just beginning. Roaches aren’t really a pest that takes care of itself when left unchecked, so you’ll want to take action immediately when encountering any warning signs for cockroaches in your home.
Worst of the warning signs for cockroaches is seeing roaches in the day
The last major warning sign may seem a bit obvious, but it probably is worse than you think if you start seeing roaches during the day. Typically, cockroaches are nocturnal and seeing them during the day is a very bad sign.
When you start seeing roaches during the day, this often means that there is overcrowding going on in your home. Most often, nocturnal creatures and pests like roaches, won’t start coming out during the day unless they are desperate.
There’s usually more than enough food and water to go around if roaches are in your home to begin with, but if they are getting desperate and begin searching for those in the day your home could be in trouble.
Cockroaches like to hide in dark, damp, humid, hot places, and coming out during the day really isn’t a place they thrive. When you start seeing them in the day it is a clear warning sign you have cockroaches in your home because all the good hiding spots are probably taken.
When their nests are getting so full that roaches are coming out in the day, you’ll want to take immediate action hiring a pest control service to eliminate the issues.
Roaches are a tough pest to eliminate and it may require multiple treatments to fully get rid of them. So the sooner you can start putting an effective pest control treatment in place the better.
Prevention steps for getting rid of cockroaches
Hopefully, it will never get to the point of needing a full roach pest control treatment if you take the necessary prevention steps. For roaches, the biggest factor is cleanliness
Roaches are scavengers and will eat food, crumbs, and even greasy spills left behind. Proper sanitation and cleanliness should be your first foundation of defense against roach infestations.
Wiping down counters, appliances, covering garbage, and not leaving out dirty dishes can be a great foundation for preventing roach issues. Without ample food sources, roaches can’t survive long in your home.
In addition to eliminating food sources, you’ll want to remove water sources as well. Some of the most common causes of water sources for pests are leaky pipes and faucets. Often you’ll find cockroaches hiding in bathrooms and kitchens under sinks, near toilets, and along leaky pipes in your walls.
Fixing these leaky faucets and pipes can help reduce opportunities for roaches to gather water and take residence in your home.
Cockroaches also like it hot and humid, so making your home cooler and drier can be another option for preventing roach issues. This solution certainly isn’t always an option depending on where you live, but when temperatures drop significantly roach eggs won’t hatch and this can cause existing roaches to leave your home.
Overall roach problems can be very difficult to try and treat on your own with diy pest control methods, so we recommend that if you are experiencing any of these warning signs for cockroaches to immediately reach out to a pest control service to eliminate the issue.
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