Cockroaches Want to Get Warm Too!

This year, our winter in southern Florida is one of the strangest on record. Higher than average rainfall amounts, together with a mix of unseasonably warm and rapidly dropping temperatures have made for an interesting holiday season.

The weather has made it even more interesting for one of our favorite Florida insects – cockroaches, or, as we like to call them, Palmetto Bugs.

But Those Aren’t Palmetto Bugs

It’s very fashionable for Floridians to say that they don’t have cockroaches in their homes, but rather Palmetto Bugs. Only one problem. Palmetto Bugs don’t come inside homes. Also known as the Florida woods cockroach, the name tells us where Palmetto Bugs hang out – in saw-palmetto fan and cabbage palm trees.

Palmetto Bugs move slower than most other species of cockroach we are familiar with in Florida, and they give off a foul odor when startled.

Inside Your Home

Coming into your home, however, the cockroaches you’re most likely to see, especially when the temperatures drop, are German Cockroaches. They are smaller and more agile than most cockroaches. And they excel at finding their way into the smallest cracks and crevices of your home’s boundaries.

Cracks in your foundation, the small space between a door and its threshold, even the tiny spaces around where pipes or wires come into your home, can be the entry point for Blattella germanica.

The roaches prefer confined, humid spaces, which also makes them hard to find.

Doubling Down

And there’s another draw to these bugs even more than the warmer temperature. Whether you’re preparing for a party, or you spent time baking goods to give as gifts, the holiday and post-holiday season tends to have more food sources that attract cockroaches.

On top of that, German cockroaches reproduce faster than other cockroaches, growing from egg to reproductive adult in roughly 50 – 60 days. After that, the females can generate 18-50 eggs per cycle. Meaning even a small infestation can grow rapidly in a short time.

How Do I Get Rid of Them?

Once you see one German cockroach, there’s no telling how many are ensconced in your home. Your best bet is to call a pest control professional to take care of the problem.

Good News Pest Solutions knows German cockroaches, and we’ve been dealing with them for more than 30 years. We’ve developed the safest, most risk-reduced solutions to your pest control issues. Our most popular treatment – Green Perimeter Plus – provides year-round coverage against all of the more prevalent creepy crawlies we see here on the Gulf Coast of Florida. For more information or to schedule your first treatment, give us a call today!