Everyone gets hungry from time to time and needs a bit of nourishment. Cockroaches are no different than any other animal when it comes to hunger. We see them scurry up walls and disappear into cracks, but someone rarely catches the roach eating food scraps or whatever they prefer. Let’s find out what they like to eat, how often it needs to happen, and what foods are bad for cockroaches in this article.
What Do Cockroaches Eat?
Like many omnivores, cockroaches will eat just about anything that presents itself to them. If the only thing they can find is stale bread, they will be eating stale bread on that day. Cockroaches are extremely good at staying alive. So good that they have been alive since dinosaurs roamed the earth.
Cockroaches walked the world in the Carboniferous Period, over 300 million years ago, and are considered ancient and one of the first insects to be discovered. The dinner menu looked a bit different during that period. Without carby starches and greasy treats like pizza, they might not have ingested as much fat or calories as they do today.
Roaches can go months without eating, which is impressive. They rarely go that long without food of some kind. These bugs will eat almost anything if typical food is not an option. They will eat glue, wallpaper, cosmetics, soap, book bindings, candles, hair, paper products, glue on box binding, crayons, toothpaste, and more. Cockroaches may even eat their acclimate if food is not found. They will survive for at least a month without food, but they do need water and will die without it within a few days.
Types of Food a Cockroach Cannot Resist
Cockroaches may not be uber-picky regarding their consumption, but they still have favorite foods they cannot resist. Some of those foods are the same type humans have difficulty resisting: over-processed junk food filled with saturated fat is the best way to win a one-way trip to diabetes land. Cockroaches can’t resist anything sweet, greasy, or starchy and love meat, spoiled or fresh, which draws them in with its enticing aroma. Another heavy-weight snack contender is cheese. Roaches love cheese. Who doesn’t?
Where Do Cockroaches Go for Food?
If you have a child and live in an area with some moisture, chances are you’ve seen an American cockroach at some point. Children are notorious for leaving food out, with crumbs scattered around them. If you don’t have children but don’t clean too terribly often, you probably have roaches. They will not go to an area that is frequently disturbed by people. Roaches prefer to hide in dark crevices, under wooden boards, and where the soil stays damp, like under your house. Crawl spaces are the perfect type of hiding place a roach looks out for.
Roaches tend to stick close to human dwellings because their access to food is easy and frequently replenished. Those dwellings are easy to find because the intense food aromas dance on the breeze, inviting them to the great feast of crumbs and leftovers. Even when humans aren’t nearby, roaches can still thrive and reproduce.
In the wild, roaches eat many things from new buds and shoots, leaves, roots, dead insects, feces from animals or insects, decaying wood, dandelion flowers and greens, red and white clover, tree nuts, fallen leaves from maple trees and others, and any rotting vegetation or carcass. They don’t need us to survive. Our aroma-rich, saturated-fat-filled treats with very little nutritional value smell great; that aroma draws them toward your home.
Tricks for Keeping Cockroaches Out of Your Kitchen
Roaches are designed to survive just about anything. These scary bugs make kitchen work gross for many. Let’s look at a few ways to keep cockroaches out of your delicious cooking.
Sugar and Baking Soda
Mix sugar and baking soda and place them in the roach’s areas of highest traffic. The sweet smell of sugar will get their attention and send them into a frenzy, looking for it. The baking soda mixed into the sugar will kill the roach once ingested.
Bay Leaves
Crushed bay leaves give off a strong scent that cockroaches can’t stand. As an insect deterrent, try crushing some leaves and sprinkling them in your cabinets and kitchen drawers.
Boric Acid
Try sprinkling boric acid in the corners of a room with roaches present. The acid dehydrates and kills insects. Add onions or other smelly food to the mixture to attract the roaches to the boric acid.
Lemon Juice
The citrusy smell of lemons is not something that roaches are attracted to. They stay away from the citrusy smell, meaning that if you clean your house or floors with a mixture of lemon juice and vinegar, you will also succeed in keeping the roaches away.
Vinegar
Vinegar will not kill or harm any roaches, but it will create a barrier between your kitchen and the roaches and drive them away. It’s a great idea to clean as much as possible in your home with vinegar. Vinegar has many uses and is suitable for cleaning hardwood floors on top of insect control.
Dish Detergent
Use a spray bottle with soapy water to spray on the cockroaches you see. The soapy mixture will clog their means of breathing, and they will suffocate. This isn’t great for pest control since you must track down and spray every hidden roach in your home.
Diatomaceous Earth
This all-natural, safe way to rid yourself of anything with an exoskeleton is excellent for roaches, fleas, ticks, and other pests. The food-grade DE acts like tiny razor blades on the exoskeleton of these insects, injuring and killing them. It is long-lasting as long as it doesn’t get wet.
Be Clean and Get Rid of Clutter
One of the best ways to ensure cockroaches steer clear of your kitchen is to remain diligent with your cleaning. A clean kitchen, with dishes neatly put away instead of stacked in filthy piles, food containers stored properly or disposed of as needed, and the trash emptied, is the perfect setup to repel roaches. The more clutter, dust, filth, and rotting food left behind, the more you are doing to attract roaches and a hefty pest control bill.
