Excerpt Article:  Mystery Rebounding Roaches

For some reason, calls regarding cockroach problems are on the rise these past months. Are cockroaches becoming more difficult to control?  Is the cockroach getting ahead of man’s current technologies and methodologies? Is this happening in both residential and commercial accounts? Has a new super roach developed? Perhaps roaches are looking to reassert their position as the number one pest. Whatever the reason, it appears that roaches are on the rebound.

German cockroaches had suddenly become a problem at a restaurant account where successful control had been maintained for many prior years reported a confounded pest professional recently. “It’s not like there are lots of roaches but they keep showing up in unusual areas a few at a time”, he said. A thorough inspection revealed that none of the typical areas held any harboring roaches yet sightings continued to occur in the kitchen and dining room. Dining tables, booths and service areas were also thoroughly inspected in order to determine areas of concern here. Sanitation at this account location was maintained at an acceptable level yet cockroach sightings persisted.

Back to Basics

Despite thorough inspections, no pocket of significant cockroach population was found so a back to basics approach was utilized. Experienced pest professionals know that the use of sticky traps is a useful tool for cockroach work. Several sticky traps were placed in strategic locations in order to help determine areas of concern and potential source locations. Monitor traps were placed, numbered and diagrammed for subsequent inspection.

Follow up inspection of these monitors proved the value of their use and served to allow the technician to zero in on the problem area. During renovation work a cosmetic wall was framed and built adjacent to a partition wall immediately adjacent to the dishwashing area of the kitchen.  This provided a well hidden void where roaches harbored that was difficult to detect prior to the use of sticky traps. An access panel was installed for inspection and service work which solved the problem at this location.

Sometimes it’s best to take a moment and look at the situation from a different perspective. Getting back to the basics or fundamentals of sound pest management practices is a good idea and helps to solve such problems.