Clearing Clutter Contributes to Cockroach Control

Clearing clutter is an important part of controlling and preventing cockroach infestations. These insects prefer to live in dense packed places and can survive on just about any kind of organic matter - even cardboard and paper.

Getting rid of clutter canyour environment much healthier for you and less attractive to the cockroaches.

Why Are Cockroaches Attracted To Your House?

Food in your home attracts cockroaches, and there are a lot of things in a house that cockroaches consider food. Like any other animal, food and water are important to cockroaches. They'll turn up anywhere that food is stored or prepared, and they can successfully survive on dropped pet food, unwashed dishes and even book binding and postage stamp glue.

Generally, a single cockroach leads to a lot more. If they have a good supply of food and water, there's no reason for them to go anywhere but your home. They'll keep on breeding there as long as the conditions are favorable to them.

Clearing Clutter Helps to Avoid the Health Problems That Come With Cockroaches

Once cockroaches enter your home, you're dealing with more than just an unpleasant pest. Cockroaches can cause significant allergies. Infestations have been strongly connected with the development of asthma in children. Since they crawl on the floor and are more likely to encounter cockroach bodies, eggs, larvae and feces, they're at a lot more danger. These parts can be embedded in carpets, around baseboards and even in household dust. There's a clear connection to allergy induced asthma:

• Sixty percent of people suffering from asthma test positive for allergies to cockroaches.
• Children with asthma who have allergies to cockroaches are three times more likely to be hospitalized for asthma if their environment includes significant exposure to large populations of cockroaches. (National Cooperative Inner City Asthma Study, 1997)
• Even when there are other allergies present, like dust mites, the level of cockroach allergens in the immediate environment is what is most associated with the development of childhood asthma.

These pests also carry a number of different bacteria types in their gastrointestinal systems. When they defecate, these bacteria are spread over the house. They include salmonella and other harmful bacterial. Cockroach infestations have been associated with diarrhea, food poisoning and a number of other illnesses in humans.

Clearing Clutter for Cockroach Control

Pest control experts refer to pest living areas as harborages.

Cockroaches come out at night while you are sleeping, and they look for dark places to hide during the day time. When resting, they like to feel cocooned and safe, with all surfaces of their bodies in contact with something. They look for extremely small cracks to rest undisturbed.

Recommended strategies for controlling cockroaches include clearing clutter and removing debris. Cardboard boxes, clothing piles, stacked newspapers and similar materials are excellent harborages. Clutter clearing strategies that help reduce the number of harborages available include the following:

• When storing items such as seasonal clothing, it's important to use plastic storage containers, rather than cardboard or any organic container. Be sure that lids fit tightly and that containers have no cracks or holes.


• Avoid storing newspapers in the home for any length of time. They should be taken immediately to a recycling container outdoors.


• Avoid leaving pet food dishes out with food and water. Instead, feed and water your pets at regular intervals, washing each dish after it has been used.


• Never store unused plastic bags beneath the kitchen sink, as they're great places for a cockroach to hide during the day.


• Get rid of corrugated cardboard that's not in use right away. Its crevices make excellent places for cockroaches to hide. They can also survive by eating the box itself. From the perspective of the cockroach, cardboard makes a perfect breeding place.

Clearing clutter from your home doesn't just mean the inside. You also need to clear exterior clutter from around the home, including recycling boxes, garbage cans close to the home and firewood. All of these things can attract cockroaches and will provide excellent harborages for them. Once the cockroach has found your house and taken up residence, it's easy for it to move through small crevices and cracks.

Go from Clearing clutter Contributes to Control Cockroach Infestations to Feng Shui Tips to Avoid Blocked Energy and read how clutter can block energy in your home and affect you on a spiritual level.

Go to Priority Health Concerns related to clutter and read about allergy induced asthma and other health risks that may be caused by clutter.

Go to Symptoms of Depression - Cause or Effect of Clutter? and read how clutter can affect your emotional health.