A Gift For You Mommy (spoiler: It's A Dead Roach)

[Mom2WhitneyandDallas]

Hello all!

So, I live in the city in a basement studio apartment. Obviously, roaches are gonna pop by to say hello every so often. Preventing bugs was never a motivation in getting cats, but it is a nice benefit. Now that the weather is getting warmer my one rando roach every few months has been a rando or a rando and a couple dead in one week. I'm getting Diamtomaceous earth to sprinkle, as I read it is most effective and pet-friendly. I think it my naive heart I was hoping that cats would just keep the roach population down to...err...NOTHING, but from what I've seen on forums it sounds like having some extra artillery is a good choice.

My cat Whitney hunted a roach I didn't even realize was hiding somewhere, tortured and killed it in front of me, and then after I came home she was standing proudly by a new roach kill. My little boy Dallas saw a roach once but couldn't reach it, so simply cried over not being able to have the arm strength to kill it that day LOL.

Has anyone lived in an apartment where roaches are/can be prevalent and had cats at the same time? Did you just let the cats take care of it, or were additional pet safe products always necessary?

 

[rubysmama]

Hello and welcome to TCS.

Thankfully, roaches aren't prevalent around here. My Ruby, has on occasion, killed scary spiders for me.

Hopefully some other members will post with their experiences. In the meantime, this might be helpful:
Do Cockroaches Harm Cats?

 

[Chizzy90]

I have a slight firebrat issue in my condominium (these little bugs are similar to silverfish). They run super fast! My little guy loves killing them for me and eating them

 

[Desertmouse]

Can I trade with someone? My cat gives me a heart attack every once in awhile when a scorpion sneaks into the house, and not just any scorpion but a bark scorpion . I’m told these tiny things are one of the most poisonous types of scorpions, every time I grab her (and usually yip when I first see them) and run to another room to keep her in until it’s safely dead. Of course she always find them before anyone notices there is any in the house . Lucky this usually only happens once or twice a year.
Back when I lived in southern Utah we had a indoor outdoor orange tabby named Oliver, within the first three weeks he had cornered both a scorpion (lucky not a bark scorpion) and a Tarantula!!

 

[Steph42q]

I've been seriously considering getting a few live crickets or meal worms from the pet store for my Kiernan. When she sees a bug, she gets SO exited. I don't really mind the occasional bug in my apartment any more because it makes her so happy.

 

[susanm9006]

We went through a horrific two month yellow jacket invasion last fall. Hundreds flying around in the basement that we just couldn’t stop from coming in although poisen sprayed on the windows caused them to slowly die. Willow was very interested in watching them writhing about on the floor while they died, but thankfully had no interest in touching them. Flies, spiders and centipedes however are another story - those are play and snack time for her. Have never had (thankfully) a roach, but I expect she would want to play with and possibly eat them.

 

[sabrinah]

When I lived somewhere with roaches my cat would bat them around sometimes. She never killed them though, so they would end up on their backs flailing around, missing a couple legs. She was good at killing and eating flies and moths. Once she hit 12 or 13 she stopped caring about bugs. Now she seems to enjoy watching me kill the bugs instead of getting off her furry butt and helping. My dog has taken on the role of fly killer. If a fly makes the mistake of flying within his reach he chases it across the house and eats it.

 

[Mom2WhitneyandDallas]

Can I trade with someone? My cat gives me a heart attack every once in awhile when a scorpion sneaks into the house, and not just any scorpion but a bark scorpion . I’m told these tiny things are one of the most poisonous types of scorpions, every time I grab her (and usually yip when I first see them) and run to another room to keep her in until it’s safely dead. Of course she always find them before anyone notices there is any in the house . Lucky this usually only happens once or twice a year.
Back when I lived in southern Utah we had a indoor outdoor orange tabby named Oliver, within the first three weeks he had cornered both a scorpion (lucky not a bark scorpion) and a Tarantula!!

Yiiikkkeeeessss!!! OK I feel like I can stop complaining now lol. I guess it's good she notices them before they get too comfortable in your home?

 

[Mom2WhitneyandDallas]

When I lived somewhere with roaches my cat would bat them around sometimes. She never killed them though, so they would end up on their backs flailing around, missing a couple legs. She was good at killing and eating flies and moths. Once she hit 12 or 13 she stopped caring about bugs. Now she seems to enjoy watching me kill the bugs instead of getting off her furry butt and helping. My dog has taken on the role of fly killer. If a fly makes the mistake of flying within his reach he chases it across the house and eats it.

Hahaha to "getting off her furry bat and helping." Whitney is quite a huntress, but Dallas not as much. He just watched her when she killed the roach like and she shot him a look like "thanks for nothing!" LOL

 

[susanm9006]

A not so funny at the time but story for you all. In my previous home I started seeing big and little ants in the kitchen that just kept coming back despite setting out any poisen. So finally I called an exterminate. Carpenter ants in the basement he says but treating was pretty simple, just some spraying and they would all die within a few weeks. So I lock the cats up on the porch and while I am at work he comes and sprays. When I get home I go down the basement and right into a horror film. The main basement room was paneled and apparently it was perfect living quarters for this enormous colony of ants. Covering nearly the entire floor are millions and millions of dieing and dead carpenter ants, like a black moving carpet. The ick factor was enormous, they were so large when you walked on them they crackled and popped like Rice Krispies so you had to sweep them aside just to walk. And not sure if these things bit or if the cats just found them as gross as I did but they weren’t going down even to use litter boxes until I built raised walkways to their litter boxes so they didn’t have to come in contact with the ants. It took six weeks walked they were finally all dead and the next summer I suited up and tore out all that nasty paneling.

 

[MegShort]

When I lived in an apartment that had a lot of bugs, out kitty killed a few but we still needed to take other measures to keep the bug population down. In that apartment we constantly had crickets coming inside, and she LOVED stalking and playing with them. I generally tried to save them though, because I don’t like killing crickets. I’m totally fine with her killing anything else though! Now we’re in a new house that doesn’t generally get many bugs, but we do currently have an infestation of drain flies. She’ll kill a few of them here and there, but not enough to get rid of them completely.

 

[Mom2WhitneyandDallas]

A not so funny at the time but story for you all. In my previous home I started seeing big and little ants in the kitchen that just kept coming back despite setting out any poisen. So finally I called an exterminate. Carpenter ants in the basement he says but treating was pretty simple, just some spraying and they would all die within a few weeks. So I lock the cats up on the porch and while I am at work he comes and sprays. When I get home I go down the basement and right into a horror film. The main basement room was paneled and apparently it was perfect living quarters for this enormous colony of ants. Covering nearly the entire floor are millions and millions of dieing and dead carpenter ants, like a black moving carpet. The ick factor was enormous, they were so large when you walked on them they crackled and popped like Rice Krispies so you had to sweep them aside just to walk. And not sure if these things bit or if the cats just found them as gross as I did but they weren’t going down even to use litter boxes until I built raised walkways to their litter boxes so they didn’t have to come in contact with the ants. It took six weeks walked they were finally all dead and the next summer I suited up and tore out all that nasty paneling.

Oh my gosh that sounds HORRIFYING I can't even imagine. Hoping your life is relatively ant-free now?

 

[danteshuman]

What about roach motels where the roaches get caught in the motel & do not exit? Also you see one roach, there are 100. Have you talked to your land lord about it? If I saw 1 I would be calling my landlord telling them there was an infestation. Technically it is your landlord's responsibility to deal with. That said the best thing you can do is check every wall & door & window and see where they could be entering. (Spoiler alert, they live in the wall!) The best you can probably do is do a roach killing fogger, put stuff that kills roaches outside the building & then keep having an exterminator kill the vermin in the walls. You might try an pest deterrent ultrasonic thing but I don't know, I could hear it. Your cat will hear it and it might drive your cat nuts.

 

[danteshuman]

And my bud Dante brings in live birds to catch/release/catch inside the house! *sigh* So far no catch & release since last fall *knock on wood*

 

[Mom2WhitneyandDallas]

What about roach motels where the roaches get caught in the motel & do not exit? Also you see one roach, there are 100. Have you talked to your land lord about it? If I saw 1 I would be calling my landlord telling them there was an infestation. Technically it is your landlord's responsibility to deal with. That said the best thing you can do is check every wall & door & window and see where they could be entering. (Spoiler alert, they live in the wall!) The best you can probably do is do a roach killing fogger, put stuff that kills roaches outside the building & then keep having an exterminator kill the vermin in the walls. You might try an pest deterrent ultrasonic thing but I don't know, I could hear it. Your cat will hear it and it might drive your cat nuts.

The landlord is aware, I just don't want chemicals in my apartment that could harm the kitty and unfortunately that is what they use :/ they give notices that they are treating the complex, but I prefer to not have them put harmful chemicals in my apartment.

Getting eco-friendly stuff that is said to be effective to treat. I think just hearing people say things like "now that I have cats I NEVER have bugs" left me thinking "Puurrrrfect I will be bug-free" but yeah...no

 

[Mom2WhitneyandDallas]

And my bud Dante brings in live birds to catch/release/catch inside the house! *sigh* So far no catch & release since last fall *knock on wood*

Ahhh, yeah, I grew up with outdoor cats and they would bring home many live "gifts" that would leave us screaming

 

[ArchyCat]

My indoor cats leave roaches and such to their staff. There is a roach bait called "Roach Motel" where a poisoned bait is enclosed in a strong plastic device, with small holes to give roaches access to the bait. None of the cats have shown any interest in the device and they do seem to work. Probably safer than widespread use of a roach spray. Good luck!

 

[Tobermory]

A not so funny at the time but story for you all. In my previous home I started seeing big and little ants in the kitchen that just kept coming back despite setting out any poisen. So finally I called an exterminate. Carpenter ants in the basement he says but treating was pretty simple, just some spraying and they would all die within a few weeks. So I lock the cats up on the porch and while I am at work he comes and sprays. When I get home I go down the basement and right into a horror film. The main basement room was paneled and apparently it was perfect living quarters for this enormous colony of ants. Covering nearly the entire floor are millions and millions of dieing and dead carpenter ants, like a black moving carpet. The ick factor was enormous, they were so large when you walked on them they crackled and popped like Rice Krispies so you had to sweep them aside just to walk. And not sure if these things bit or if the cats just found them as gross as I did but they weren’t going down even to use litter boxes until I built raised walkways to their litter boxes so they didn’t have to come in contact with the ants. It took six weeks walked they were finally all dead and the next summer I suited up and tore out all that nasty paneling.

That sounds just like my experience with roaches when I lived in Florida back in the 80s. I was on one side of a duplex; the other side was occupied by three 20-something guys...guys who clearly never cleaned the kitchen. When they moved out, their disgusting little friends moved in with me. I had three indoor cats (I always have three cats), two who were five or six and one who was a few months. They were all ardent bug hunters and consumers. The massive influx of roaches was just too much for them, though. I carted them off to a cat-loving friend’s house (the cats, not the roaches) while the exterminator did his work.

After he sprayed, we waited awhile and he had me come back inside with him. Horror movie, indeed. They were dropping off the walls and ceilings, crawling drunkenly across the floor and countertops, and lying on their backs with their nasty little legs in the air by the thousands. And Exterminator Guy says, “You know, for every one you see here, there are 50 more behind the walls.” Well that’s just peachy, dude. Thanks for that image in my head. If I could have, I would have moved out that very day.

The girls and I hung out at my friend’s house for a couple of days while I scrubbed every square inch of the apartment. Thus began my obsessive drive to NEVER leave even a crumb on the countertop and the increased profitability of Rubber Maid and Tupperware since every bit of food—mine and the cats’—went into sealed plastic containers.

 

[danteshuman]

I lived in a house as a child with roaches living in the backyard coming in under the door every night! My dad got rid of them with couple of chickens and roach hotels. I would still get an exterminator & seal up any holes they could be invading your house from. .... Thus my extreme hatred of roaches was built That was I mentioned killing them outside & inside your place.

Yes I would shell at the extra $ to call Orkin to get rid of them _now_! Evil filthy icky things

(And Dante brings the birds inside not as gifts but so they can't fly away as he hunts them! I keep catching & releasing said birds .... and he stopped bringing them up to my room ... instead he released the last ones in the stairway As long as my roommates don't hang the bird feeders low, the birds are safe from my lazy slightly chunky cat )