I had an unwelcome visitor last night. Just as I was about to sit down with my piping hot dinner, I glanced up and saw a cockroach creeping along in the kitchen, where the wall meets the ceiling.
Frankly, I was horrified. I know people who live in Sydney are used to seeing cockroaches everywhere, but those of us who reside elsewhere in the country are not. On one memorable occasion I was visiting a friend of a friend’s place in Sydney, relaxing on the couch, when I looked down and saw the dog chewing on something. Yep, a cockroach. Nobody batted an eyelid.
So I rang my formerly-Sydneysider brother-in-law Adrian for advice: he said to squash it, then be sure to find the eggs it drops.
Knowing the legends about cockroaches surviving a nuclear attack, I prepared a huge industrial-sized wad of rolled-up newspaper. (Gross bits coming up.)
I’m not sure if I was shouting and swearing at it as I killed it, but it’s quite possible. By the end of the battle it there was the stain of cockroach blood on the newspaper, and it lay dead on the floor in two pieces.
I found what looked like the eggs (little white things) and attempted to clean them up. Hopefully I got them all — I wouldn’t be happy for a little cockroach colony to settle here.
Adrian’s ominous words were ringing in my ears: “If there’s one… there’s probably more.” To which all I can say is: I’m glad I’m moving soon.
16 replies on “All cockroaches must die”
oh I hate creepy crawlies!
Yuck! I recall seeing one in my apartment and freaking out. Argh, I hate those bugs. Yuck! At the nature museum in town they have a display with cockroaches. I won’t even go near it! My skin with the thought. Ugh, I pity you and I hope the new place doesn’t have them either.
Ewww! Gross. That’s the one thing I am scared about in our own place but if we ever did have roaches, I think my cats would eat them. They like spiders and moths…
LOL. I know that heaps of people have hatred for cockroaches, but for some reason they have never bothered me. Same with any insect. I always try to return them outside to whence they came.
Don’t get me wrong I don’t want a house full of cockroaches either!
You’ll like this Daniel, I was once on a tram, and discovered a green garden spider probably about half a centimetre across living on one of the green handrails for camoflage. I rescue him and he walked around and around my hand (weaving a web as he went). When we got off the tram I put him in a nearby tree where he his hopefully still living :)
I think Brisbane’s probably worse for cockroaches than Sydney. Then there’s the 10cm+ wolf spiders and huntsmans… but apparently the orb-weavers have been disappearing over the last year or so. This is not good.
oh yuck yuck yuck! and the worse thing is that cockroach blood doesn’t even look like blood!
Been in Melbourne for two months and haven’t seen a cockroach yet, though. I’d probably have the same reaction as yourself when I finally do.
I always thought we didn’t have cockroaches in Melbourne – only in other warmer cities – until we moved to a more ‘posh’ suburb. Suddenly in this suburb full of old houses by the river, we were overrun with cockroaches. They used to be my morbid fear and I’d have nightmares about them. Yesterday, when I saw one crawling through the washing basket of my clean underwear I hardly flinched. I still HATE them, but now I know they’re around. It’s one of the reasons I will always prefer cold weather to hot.
You once gave me help with a telephone problem I was having so I am returning the favor by offering some hope where your cockroaches are concerned…
It IS possible to get rid of them, unless you live in a large metropolis that is rampant with them. If you visit New York City or Chicago, for example, don’t order room service – they will carry off your tray!
My sister lived in Florida, then moved back to Michigan and stayed with me while looking for a place of her own. A few of these bugs hitched a ride with her belongings. It took a few of months of laying down roach traps (see your local hardware store), but they were eventually ‘dispatched’.
The only other experience I had with them was when one came home with me in a grocery bag. The store had probably just gotten a fresh shipment of more than just groceries from some central warehouse in Alabama or someplace.
Now if only it was that easy with spiders…
What a cute little cockroach! Not too scary or disgusting compared to the palmetto bugs that are common here in Miami, Florida, USA. A palmetto bug is a large cockroach that can be up to an inch and a half long {about 4 cm.in metric} and they can fly! The smaller variety is also very common throughout the United States and can be found in most every restaurant kitchen, apartment building, and supermarket in the nation. My cats will eat the small ones but the palmetto bugs are reguarded as a plaything to be dismembered and scattered about the house.
In my Sydney/Melbourne life I don’t think I ever saw a cockroach in Melbourne, but I saw plenty in Sydney. England doesn’t seem so big on ’em, but maybe I’ve just been living in newer, less damp places.
There are things you can purchase which plug into your powerpoint (like those plug-in room fresheners) which emit an electronic? radio? sonic? frequency which deters cockroaches. I have one in my bedroom, and it did seem to work. It stopped my total fear of raising my curtains each morning to find cockroaches playing in the folds, or seeing them run across my dressing table; it’s been a while since I’ve found one in my room.
Our house isn’t old or damp; it’s a big, airy house built about 5 years ago, but I think it was how the soil was disturbed when the house was being built that introduced the cockroaches. After they went away they returned again when the house 2 doors down was having extensions, and again when we were paving our backyard. Seems they prefer living quietly in the undisturbed soil, and I can understand that!
I got used to living with them when I lived in Los Angeles in the 80’s but have never been able to hide my disgust at the creepyu crawly things. We lived in an old house which had a hide-away ironing cupboard which I never used. I made the mistake of opening it in front of guests one time and it was literally crawling with cockroaches. 1000’s of the blighters. First and last time I ever looked in that cupboard. We used to have “cockroach motels” listed as a regular item on our grocery list. Thankful to say that I have only ever seen a couple of cockroaches in my almost 50 years of living in Melbourne and hope it remains that way.
My youngest daughter is the proud owner of a bird-eating spider and I have this awe/fear thing going on with it. As long as it’s safely contained I can stand in front of it all day but god forbid if it ever got out whilst I was around. I personally think it should be where it belongs but my daughter dotes on it.
Ah guys, come to Brisbane to find out what pest control is all about!
That was the first of many millions of roaches, trust me. Here in Vegas, that’s all we see. As the Dead Kennedys put it, “There’s rats chewing up the kitchen, roaches up to my knees.”
We have lived in a leafy inner suburb just minutes from the city of Melbourne for over 20 years. Have never seen a cockroach….until about 2 years ago. Now there are far too many! Fortunately, the family cat has taken it upon himself to keep the backyard population in check. Questions are, has a cockroach plauge recently been unleased on Melbourne? And are all areas subject to this annoying problem?
Solution for cockroaches — sprinkle a “line” of boric acid powder around all possible entrances like pipes, floor/wall seams, in cupboards, etc. In a few weeks, enough of the creatures will have tracked the powder back to their nests and little by little they’ll all die. If you rely on killing them one at a time, you’ll always have more. Another similar antidote: diatomaceous earth… These powders are much less toxic to humans, dogs, cats, etc. Good luck from Toronto, Canada.