Dead cockroaches attract more roaches. It’s because the dead roaches are food for the cockroaches that are alive.
So, if you don’t dispose of the dead cockroaches after killing them, you’ll invite more roaches to your home.
In this guide, you’ll find out why killing a cockroach attract more roaches. You’ll learn the exact reason behind it.
You’ll learn the best ways to kill cockroaches in your home and how to safely remove the dead roaches so that they don’t attract more of them.
Keep reading.
Why Does Killing A Cockroach Attract More Roaches?
Dead cockroaches, and many dead bugs, while dead emit a fatty acid known as oleic acid. That smell from the oleic acid signals cockroaches, and many other bugs, that the bug lying there is food.
To prove it, researchers did an experiment. They sprayed oleic acid on a bunch of live ants.
Guess what happened? The other ants ate them.
That same thing happens in the case of roaches. The dead roaches will attract other roaches and many other types of carnivorous bugs like ants, centipedes, and spiders.
Another thing that plays a major role in attracting roaches to dead roaches is the pheromones.
Pheromones are secretions that bugs emit to communicate with each other.
They discharge pheromones when they reach a food source. The other bugs pick up the smell of the pheromones and reach the food source.
The male bugs discharge pheromones during the mating season to attract females.
So, when you kill a roach by crushing it under your shoes, it’s glands bust and all the guts, fats, and, most importantly, the pheromones splatter out.
How To Dispose Of Dead Roaches?
Eliminating the dead roaches is vital to prevent cockroaches. So, remove the dead roaches from the floor or from anywhere in your home with a broom and dirt scoop.
And discard the dead roaches outside of your property.
The place where you found dead roaches have the elements from the roaches bodies and their smells too, especially when you’ve smashed the cockroaches.
Leaving those smells, which contain pheromones, will attract other roaches.
So, clean the surface with a disinfectant or with bleach. Then use essential oils spray like the peppermint oil on the surface.
Cleaning will remove the oleic acid and the pheromones that splashed out from the roaches’ bodies. And roaches hate the smell of peppermint. So, the peppermint smell will keep roaches away.
Why Do Adult Roaches Eat Their Nymphs?
Cockroach eggs, and baby roaches become adult roaches’ source of nutrition when they run out of food.
Roach exterminators use a method known as exclusion. This method is all about denying the moisture and food sources to the roaches so that they start eating their kin.
So, when there’s a lack of nourishment for roaches inside a home, roaches start to eat their nymphs, their own eggs, and most disgustingly, their own poop too.
Cockroach nymphs are defenseless against adult roaches.
The nymphs are not fast enough to escape. And their underdeveloped exoskeletons are weak.
That makes these nymphs are an easy target or, in other words, an easy meal.
Can You Kill A Cockroach By Stepping On It?
No, you can’t. If you just step on a cockroach casually and walk away, then the cockroach won’t die.
Cockroaches can withstand 900 times their bodyweight on them. So, stepping on the cockroach or even repeatedly hitting on it with a newspaper won’t kill the cockroach.
It’s hard to kill a cockroach by just stomping on it. A cockroach can easily survive even when it’s abdomen is busted and it’s guts splashed out.
If you want to crush a cockroach then you’ll have to repeatedly hit on it’s head multiple times, till it stops moving.
Do it by wearing shoes. Don’t squish a cockroach barefoot or with bare hands.
How To Kill Roaches? The Safest Ways
As dead cockroaches attract more roaches, so should you kill roaches?
Of course, yes!
Killing roaches is an integral part of eliminating roach infestation from your home. The cockroach infestation will grow and take over your home if you don’t.
There are many methods to kill roaches. And one of the most common ways is by using boric acid.
Mix boric acid with sugar or peanut butter and keep it in a jar. The peanut butter or sugar will attract the roaches.
And the roaches will feed on it.
The boric acid will get into the cockroaches’ system and cause them to die. If mixed with sugar, the boric acid and sugar will stick with the bodies of roaches.
The roaches will go to their nests. And their kin will eat off the mixture from their bodies.
So, not only will the roaches that invaded the jar to eat the mixture die, but also the roaches that ate the mixture from the roaches’ bodies.
Gel baits are also one of the easiest ways to eliminate roaches from your home.
Use a few drops of gel baits near the gaps and cracks where you’ve noticed roaches. Keep the gel baits at a 2-3 feet distance from each other.
Ensure that you’ve used gel baits covering the room’s entire area.
The gel baits lure the cockroaches out of hiding. And when they feed on it, they die.
Both gel baits and boric acid help a lot to reduce cockroach infestation inside your home.
Another useful product that you can use to eliminate roaches is the pheromone roach trap.
Pheromone traps emit the scent of pheromones that insects and cockroaches use to communicate with each other.
Keeping those traps near the hiding places of the roaches will attract roaches. The traps will trick them into thinking that it’s food.
However, they get stuck when the roaches set foot on the trap.
Keep multiple traps in places like underneath sinks, along the baseboards, in your kitchen, kitchen cabinets, and basement overnight.
Dispose of the traps with roaches stuck on them the next morning.
Diatomaceous earth is also a proven roach killer. Scatter diatomaceous earth in your home where you’ve noticed roaches.
The diatomaceous earth penetrates the roaches’ exoskeleton. And on entering their system, the diatomaceous earth absorbs the fatty acids and the moisture in their bodies.
That causes severe dehydration in the roaches, causing them to die.
However, do keep in mind that cockroaches play dead. Some of the roaches might appear dead while lying on their back.
That happens when the toxins in the baits get into their system but don’t kill them. Roaches get into a state of shock momentarily.
And when roaches recover, they flutter on their back, struggling to get up. It’s because their center of gravity is high on their bodies. So, their body weight is too much to move when flipped over.
But if the fluttering roaches can cling onto something, they can get back onto their feet and return to their nests.
So, to be sure that the roaches are dead, it’ll be best to use a roach spray on the dead roaches before disposing of them.
These methods kill roaches of all species. And they’re way more effective in reducing the number of cockroaches in your house than your average cockroach sprays or foggers.
But there are many ways to kill a cockroach without touching.
How To Keep Roaches Away From Your Home
The better and long-term solution to keep roaches away from your home is to make your home unattractive to them.
Here are a few ways to make your home unattractive to roaches –
- Keep your home, especially the bathroom and kitchen, clean. Remove food stains and food crumbs in your kitchen. They attract roaches.
- Dispose of the food wastes from your kitchen trash bins daily. Keep moth balls or cedar balls in cardboard boxes that you keep in basement, garage, or store rooms to prevent roaches from hiding in the boxes.
- Keep your yard clean. Your yard is one of the places from where roaches sneak inside. Wood cockroaches also enter your home from the yard.
- Keep your drains unclogged. Sewer roaches use the drains to get inside your bathroom.
- Caulk gaps and cracks in your home’s walls, doors, and windows with a silicone-based sealant. Roaches can’t chew through it.
- And, most importantly, ensure there’s no water leakage in your home and yard. Water leakages increase dampness in your home. That attracts roaches and many other bugs.
Roaches also hate the smell of peppermint and eucalyptus essential oils.
On top of making your home unattractive to roaches, spraying essential oils like peppermint in your home will emit a smell that cockroaches hate.
Nang Chen is an Entomologist and Arachnologist who is associated with Vienna’s museum of natural history. He’s also a consultant with real estate groups, insecticide conglomerates and law enforcement groups as a forensic entomologist. Nang Chen holds an M.S. from South China University and he’s a regular contributor to our site.