Exterminating!

[Calico]

We have been overrun with ants and waterbugs (big black roaches) this summer due the heat and need to have our house sprayed. I don't know what to do with my T's. How do you handle it if your home needs to be exterminated?

 

[Tortoise Tom]

Don't! It won't work anyway. Believe me, I'm no hippy, but spreading toxic pesticides all over your place simply doesn't work and does a lot of harm. The ants are underground, so the vast majority of them won't be reached, and the cockroaches will come right back as soon as the toxicity level lowers and the first ones back will be most resistant to those pesticides. Meanwhile you and your loved ones are living in a toxic wasteland and all of the beneficial insects, along with the animals that eat insects are all poisoned and killed off too.

There are better strategies that work better and don't have the toxic, environment destroying side effects. I've had to learn these techniques because I keep so many insects, reptiles, birds, and other little animals that would either be killed by the toxins outright or poisoned by eating an insect that got into the toxins.

First, tell me what type of ants and roaches we are dealing with, and I'll give you SAFE strategies to rid yourself of them in a much more effective way. I've had to learn these techniques the hard way with much rial and error over many years. You can have the benefit of all that work for free! There are about two dozen insect species called "waterbugs" and several of those are roaches. Usually blatta lateralis or Blatta orientalis, espcecially here in CA. What part of CA are you in? This will also determine what will work. Buy or make a bunch of roach motels for the roaches. You'll get rid of them and all their babies by the dozens. Place the traps in dry areas with lots of cover.

Ants depend more on what type and whether they are indoors or out. I've got good strategies for both and for the big red ants, and for the little Argentine ants.

 

[Calico]

Don't! It won't work anyway. Believe me, I'm no hippy, but spreading toxic pesticides all over your place simply doesn't work and does a lot of harm. The ants are underground, so the vast majority of them won't be reached, and the cockroaches will come right back as soon as the toxicity level lowers and the first ones back will be most resistant to those pesticides. Meanwhile you and your loved ones are living in a toxic wasteland and all of the beneficial insects, along with the animals that eat insects are all poisoned and killed off too.

There are better strategies that work better and don't have the toxic, environment destroying side effects. I've had to learn these techniques because I keep so many insects, reptiles, birds, and other little animals that would either be killed by the toxins outright or poisoned by eating an insect that got into the toxins.

First, tell me what type of ants and roaches we are dealing with, and I'll give you SAFE strategies to rid yourself of them in a much more effective way. I've had to learn these techniques the hard way with much rial and error over many years. You can have the benefit of all that work for free! There are about two dozen insect species called "waterbugs" and several of those are roaches. Usually blatta lateralis or Blatta orientalis, espcecially here in CA. What part of CA are you in? This will also determine what will work. Buy or make a bunch of roach motels for the roaches. You'll get rid of them and all their babies by the dozens. Place the traps in dry areas with lots of cover.

Ants depend more on what type and whether they are indoors or out. I've got good strategies for both and for the big red ants, and for the little Argentine ants.

I totally agree with you Tom as far as the pesticides go. I don't like them either. But I dislike ants and roaches in my home just as much.

The ants are indoors and outdoors. Just your regular little black ants that are everywhere! I kill the little scouts when I see them but then turn around and there are 5 more! No idea where they come from. As for the waterbugs, I think they are the Oriental roaches. I have found several egg sacs laying on my kitchen floor and in my kitchen trash can. Ugh!

So any information you can provide will be greatly appreciated.

 

[Tortoise Tom]

I totally agree with you Tom as far as the pesticides go. I don't like them either. But I dislike ants and roaches in my home just as much.

The ants are indoors and outdoors. Just your regular little black ants that are everywhere! I kill the little scouts when I see them but then turn around and there are 5 more! No idea where they come from. As for the waterbugs, I think they are the Oriental roaches. I have found several egg sacs laying on my kitchen floor and in my kitchen trash can. Ugh!

So any information you can provide will be greatly appreciated.

Indoors in summer the ants are looking for water and somewhere to escape the heat. Terro ant baits work great. The hard part is you have to wait for an invasion, or make one by leaving some food out on the floor, and then put the bait station in their path and leave it alone. As hard as it is, don't kill any. What you have to understand is that even when there are 10,000 ants swarming the crumb in your kitchen, there are millions more underground. Killing the 10,000 does nothing. Instead allow the 10,000 to cary back the deadly bait back to the rest of the colony and wipe them all out. We had nothing but problems when we moved into this house. I think the whole hill we live on is one giant ant hill. We killed MILLIONS of them. It was a daily battle. More just kept coming every day. I sprayed inside, I sprayed outside, I did poison granules, and I paid to have professionals come spray. It did nothing to stem the tide. One pack of Terro trays wiped them all out. We saw zero ants for almost two years after that. Every once in a while a new group will find its way in. I put the Terro bait tray in their path and leave them alone to swarm it. Sometimes there are so many that they empty the whole tray. You want to smash them all and clean the whole area, but you have to leave them alone to deliver your deadly package. At first they'd swarm the baits for two days and I'd keep putting down new ones as they emptied each tray. Eventually, all that was left was an empty plastic bait tray and no other evidence that they'd ever been there.

We had oriental Roches in the house where I grew up. I start a colony with them in a bin in my reptile room. Great tarantula food, but they have a bit of a skunky odor when kept indoors in quantity. Roach motels do a great job of catching them and removing them from the environment and the breeding population. Not having insecticides everywhere outside will also allow their natural predators to come in and control their numbers too. Its like rodent poison. You put out poison because you saw a rat. Rat eats the poison and then a hawk or owl eats the dying poisoned rat and dies too. Now you've removed a predator that would have eaten two or three rats a day every day all year long. The remaining rats can breed and go crazy because their predators in the area are all dead. You end up making a much bigger problem than you already had. Same with insecticidal sprays around your house.

 

[Calico]

Indoors in summer the ants are looking for water and somewhere to escape the heat. Terro ant baits work great. The hard part is you have to wait for an invasion, or make one by leaving some food out on the floor, and then put the bait station in their path and leave it alone. As hard as it is, don't kill any. What you have to understand is that even when there are 10,000 ants swarming the crumb in your kitchen, there are millions more underground. Killing the 10,000 does nothing. Instead allow the 10,000 to cary back the deadly bait back to the rest of the colony and wipe them all out. We had nothing but problems when we moved into this house. I think the whole hill we live on is one giant ant hill. We killed MILLIONS of them. It was a daily battle. More just kept coming every day. I sprayed inside, I sprayed outside, I did poison granules, and I paid to have professionals come spray. It did nothing to stem the tide. One pack of Terro trays wiped them all out. We saw zero ants for almost two years after that. Every once in a while a new group will find its way in. I put the Terro bait tray in their path and leave them alone to swarm it. Sometimes there are so many that they empty the whole tray. You want to smash them all and clean the whole area, but you have to leave them alone to deliver your deadly package. At first they'd swarm the baits for two days and I'd keep putting down new ones as they emptied each tray. Eventually, all that was left was an empty plastic bait tray and no other evidence that they'd ever been there.

We had oriental Roches in the house where I grew up. I start a colony with them in a bin in my reptile room. Great tarantula food, but they have a bit of a skunky odor when kept indoors in quantity. Roach motels do a great job of catching them and removing them from the environment and the breeding population. Not having insecticides everywhere outside will also allow their natural predators to come in and control their numbers too. Its like rodent poison. You put out poison because you saw a rat. Rat eats the poison and then a hawk or owl eats the dying poisoned rat and dies too. Now you've removed a predator that would have eaten two or three rats a day every day all year long. The remaining rats can breed and go crazy because their predators in the area are all dead. You end up making a much bigger problem than you already had. Same with insecticidal sprays around your house.

Wow, what great information. I will look for the Terro bait trays. I just don't like the idea of having to "wait for the invasion". And I agree with you as to thinking you live on an ant hill! That's what it seems like sometimes.

After I had disposed of the roach egg sacs, I thought, why didn't I keep them and let them hatch. Free T food! But I'm sure that wouldn't have been a good idea.

Thank you for the information.

 

[Whitelightning777]

I find that the ant bait boxes work better then any sprays. I've also used roach baits when I saw exactly one roach and haven't seen any since with the exception of feeders.

Here's the best anti-roach killer known to myself.

A cat with a high prey drive!! Of course, there's only 1 Nyx the cat!!

The sprays just don't work unless you're aiming at one particular bug. If you must fumigate, I'd move the Ts outside or else get a motel room for a night or two and move the cages there, under wraps with a do not disturb sign on the door.

 

[Jess S]

Nice looking cat

 

[Whitelightning777]

Nyx, aka the Nipster, is an ex feral cat that my late girlfriend (RIP) worked on intensely to domesticate. At first we called her the UFO, unidentified fuzzy object & she was basically wild. It took years to do this, but let no one tell you that it's impossible to tame an adult feral cat. It just takes a lot longer, like training a serval or a bobcat to adapt to human behavior.

Oh, & did I mention how smart she is? She DOES recognize herself in the mirror, will hide TV remotes under the same thing that her toys for knocked under when she can't find them & can open closet doors and bedroom doors, a real problem solver.

Biologists will completely deny that any non-primate can do this. They haven't met Nyx.

This is also why I use enclosures built like Fort Knox & not deli cups among other reasons. I had to tie tarantulas in there somewhere.