Cockroach vs. Cicada, two different insects/invertebrates that can seem similar at first glance but can be distinguished from each other. Many traits make it easy for you to know whether it’s a cockroach or a cicada once you have the facts.
It may be important to know the difference between these two.
We all thought that 2021 is the year after the COVID pandemic when everything will be getting back to normal, but not exactly for those who can’t stand insects. It is because this year, Brood X, a brood of periodical cicadas, will set to storm the United States.
It is a winged insect that has a flat and oval-shaped body with a long antenna. The number of wings depends on the gender of the cockroach. Usually, male cockroaches have two pairs of wings. On the other hand, females are wingless and have only vestigial wings.
Despite having wings, most male and female insects cannot fly. These insects usually prefer to live in a moderately warm environment that is neither too cold nor too hot.
What is a Cicada?
Cicadas, also scientifically known as Cicadoidea, are spineless insects. With 3000+ species present, most cicadas are around us once a year (annual cicadas) and after every 1 to 2 decades (periodical cicadas).
North America is the only place throughout the world where people have spotted periodical cicadas. On the flip side, annual cicadas are common in many parts of the world.
Cockroach vs. Cicada: The Main Differences
If you are someone who finds it hard to differentiate between a cockroach and a cicada, here’s a list of distinguishable traits for their identification.
Looks and Identifying Traits
Physical appearance is the most distinguishable factor/trait of these two insects.
With a small head and flat body, cockroaches have red-brown integument, compound eyes, and two simple eyes along with an antenna.
Opposite to it, cicadas have a broad head with stout bodies and wings through which running veins are visible. Cicadas also have two large compound eyes and three simple eyes.
Endothermic or Ectothermic insects
Endotherms are those organisms that are capable of temperature regulation. Oppositely, those organisms that cannot maintain their body temperature within a tolerable range are called ectotherms.
For example, cockroaches are ectotherms because of the inability to regulate their body’s internal metabolism. Contrarily, cicadas lie between ectotherms and endotherms as they use both these mechanisms for body heat production.
The natural habitat of cockroaches and cicadas
Natural habitats are the areas where a living organism can live, grow, and breed independently.
For example, the natural habitat of cockroaches includes lead litter, debris, bark cavities, and plant stems and woods.
On the other hand, cicadas inhabit tree trunks, twigs, and woody shrubs where they suck the juice or sap of these plants.
Which part of the US are cockroaches and insects present?
You can find North American cockroaches in sewers and drains. City sewer systems of the US are the parts where most cockroaches are present. Many cockroaches are around us seasonally during the spring or summer.
Likewise, central and eastern regions, including Midwest, are the part of the US where most periodical cicadas reside. Periodical cicadas are around us every 13 to 17 years.
For instance, Brood X is one brood of about 15 biggest periodical cicadas present in the US that appear after 17 years. And 2021 is going to be the year in which this cicada brood will set to emerge.
What do cockroaches and cicadas eat?
Eating plays a vital role in the survival and reproduction of any organism.
Being omnivores, cockroaches eat meat and plants, including dietary dishes, pet foods, garbage, hair, and even books.
Unlike cockroaches, cicadas are herbivores that eat plant debris and feed on the juices and root sap of large trees and twigs. Reproduction of cicadas passes through three stages:
Eggs
Nymphs
Adult cicadas
Nymphs cannot eat twigs, so they depend only on plant juices. Inversely, adult cicadas, imagoes, eat them.
Are cockroaches and cicadas dangerous?
Organisms are called dangerous based on how much harm they cause to us (human beings) and our surroundings.
Cockroaches induce asthma attacks and trigger various allergies. Some of them also contain bacteria that cause diarrhea, typhoid fever, and vomiting. As a result, we can say that cockroaches are dangerous but usually not deadly and also bite.
But when it comes to whether cicadas are dangerous or not, the answer is no! It’s because most cicadas are harmless to human beings, do not sting or bite, and most of their species are beneficial for plants.
Because of their size, they can be off putting to people but present no harm.
Actually, cicadas are great for our environment. When cicadas die off, they provide nitrogen to the plants for better growth.
Do I Have A Cockroach or Cicada Infestation?
Cockroach or cicada infestation occurs when you have a large number of these insects around your area or home.
How to tell if there is a cockroach infestation?
Cockroaches are nocturnal means they are active during the night. Some of the signs of cockroach infestation are:
Black coffee-like drops on the floor
Brown irregular marks on watery ground
Cockroach shells because they shed their skin 5 to 8 times during their lifecycle
Damaged organic food packaging, leather, or books
How to tell cicada infestation?
Cicada is a common diurnal insect, which means they remain active during daylight. If you see mud chimneys, holes in your home lawn and hear buzzing sounds, the chances are that it is a cicada infestation. Research shows that some species of North American cicadas can produce sounds as high as up to 105 decibels. Such high-pitched sounds can even put planes to shame.
How to get rid of infestation?
To get rid of a cockroach infestation, avoid putting open organic food overnight, wash dishes, and close food containers. Moreover, keep your surroundings clean and take the help of a pest control professional in extreme conditions.
Likewise, you can prevent cicada infestation by spraying water on your plants with a garden hose. Furthermore, wrapping twigs with foil is also a way to get rid of this infestation.
With all these facts in hand, you can now easily distinguish these two insects from one and other.
Cockroaches are no doubt one of the most
annoying pests to ever exist.
They crawl everywhere and die only after you have tried a hundred things.
Now that wouldn’t have been that big a problem if they didn’t reproduce at the rate they actually do.
For example, a single German cockroach can infest your house with dozens of eggs within days, which can lead to the birth of thousands of baby roaches in a single year.
Sounds scary I know!
That’s why today, we will answer some of the most common questions usually asked about cockroaches and their eggs.
While this does sound easy, it usually isn’t unless you know ways of getting rid of them efficiently.
Now, there are many ways to kill roaches; some are quicker than others, but you should know about all of them.
So, which is the fastest way to kill them?
Roach spray is the fastest & most effective way to eradicate these pests; but, to make it work, you need to spray it directly on roaches.
Let’s learn about other quick ways to eliminate them
11 Quick Ways To Eliminate Roaches Instantly
Roach Spray
This is the quickest way to eliminate roaches; there is nothing faster than spraying directly on the cockroach to kill it instantly.
The urge to just smash a cockroach flat instantly at just the sight of it is uncontrollable.
An urge as such is understandable and to just put an end to their infestation by smacking roaches is impractical much.
A much easier way to eliminate and kill roaches is by using sprays.
Roach sprays are used to target the areas where the cockroaches gather, like the cracks, window frames, skirting boards, and places usually not reachable with bare hands.
Roach spray is an aerosol spray that comes in cans or bottles.
On spraying, the effect starts within seconds and kills the cockroach sprayed on in no more than 5 minutes.
The basic pesticide used in a roach spray is synthetic pyrethroids; this affects the central nervous system of the cockroach and kills it as quickly as possible.
How To Use A Roach Spray
First, cover your nose with a face mask or tie a handkerchief around your face before you use the roach spray.
Then, locate the target area and place the nozzle of the can pointing at the area where you want to spray.
Once the nozzle is pointed towards the affected area of your house, spray it.
It is essential to keep children and pets away when using such roaches sprays to eliminate them as they release harmful chemicals.
Cockroach Gel Bait
To keep roaches at bay, humans come up with various seemingly effective solutions.
Not all of them work a cent percent but, we never stop trying.
In this war against roaches, cockroach gel bait is one such hopeful solution.
The effectiveness of this is, however, not up-to-the-mark.
To lure cockroaches into falling for this bait is tricky; the catch here is to entice a cockroach into eating the gel bait.
In most cases, cockroaches exhibit a certain kind of aversion towards it; therefore, infestation continues if they do not consume it.
The bait works very rarely as most of the time, it’s difficult to locate them as they can be scattered all over a place.
How To Use Gel Bait
To use
this bait, one needs to follow the following steps:
Firstly, you must locate the spots you want to target.
Usually, places with feces of any kind or leftover food near trash cans in your kitchen or small cracks and crevices in walls and floors are where these critters are found.
Then, once the spots are located, place small dots of the gel bait.
The gel bait dries up over time, losing its effect; therefore, keep reapplying it for successfully killing the roaches.
Well, the list of predators is never-ending; as it turns out, a cockroach is like a delicacy for many animals, including mammals, reptiles, amphibians.
Reptiles like lizards are one of the greatest predators of cockroaches; be it house lizards or geckos.
Frogs too like to feast on cockroaches; the list also includes turtles and some birds.
Particular species of spiders eat roaches; even RIFA ants, which are the invasive red imported fire ants, prey on cockroaches.
The Argentine black sugar ants are also predators of cockroaches; other than these, mites, centipedes, and roundworms too feed on cockroaches.
Boric Acid
If you want a fairly inexpensive alternative to getting rid of cockroaches and a lesser harmful way of pest control, boric acid is your answer.
Boric acid is highly poisonous for cockroaches and is the best bait that you can use at home.
However, the only drawback of it is that, on getting the faintest whiff of boric acid, the cockroaches, instead of eating it, go as far away from possible.
That does not kill them; in order to die, they must consume the powder.
How To Use Boric Acid
First, you will need to eliminate the smell of boric acid to lure roaches into eating it; to achieve that, you need to mix boric acid with raw egg yolk.
Take 50 mg of Boric acid and mix it well with one raw egg yolk.
After blending it well, it will form into a gruel. Roll the gruel into small balls of 1 cm in diameter and leave these balls to dry.
Once dried, spread these balls in the targeted territories and let the cockroaches snack on them.
Or you can also leave the powder as it is by sprinkling them all over the desired location like sinks, toilet bowls, places around any water source, and around trash bins.
Once the infestation seems to have uprooted, you can wash off the boric acid with a wet rag.
The combination plays a ‘trap to kill’ as sugar attracts the cockroaches and the baking soda kills.
Cockroaches do not have any gastrointestinal mechanism to release gas; therefore, eating baking soda and then drinking water after it creates gas, thus causing death.
How To Use Baking Soda
You must mix equal parts of sugar to equal amounts of soda and leave it on unusable plates or lids of old containers in places that are not easily reachable, like behind wardrobes, under sinks, under refrigerators.
If possible, mix yeast with the mixture and let the roaches get lured to eat it.
Once they eat the mixture, they go near water sources and die due to the explosion of its stomach.
Borax
Borax is an efficient killer of cockroaches; it is inexpensive and easy to use.
The arrangement of the killing of cockroaches with borax is not entirely the best-planned killing as it leaves behind a lot of mess.
However, it’s compelling enough; it might not be instant, but the results are certainly positive.
How To Use Borax
You cannot simply leave borax in the open for the roaches to feed and eliminate them.
Firstly, locate the most known places of gathering; usually, areas surrounding water sources or places in your house with easy availability of food for roaches.
Once you have located it, dust the area with borax.
The cockroaches walk over the dusted area, and the borax stick to their feet, and when they clean their feet off, the borax is eaten by them, which causes their death later.
Sometimes, on feasting upon the dead cockroaches, the feeding ones die too if there remain traces of borax.
Bleach
Bleach is an inexpensive repellent; it gives off a strong smell that the roaches hate.
It sure is doubtful to put a complete end to your roach problem, however, you can use it to keep them at bay.
Therefore, instead of enticing them to eat, the smell of bleach sends them away.
Use an old bottle and attach a small spraying nozzle.
Make a solution of bleach and water and pour it inside the bottle.
Shake it well before spraying them on the cockroaches.
However, bleach is a corrosive product therefore it’s not really advisable to use bleach to treat your cockroach problem at home.
Diatomaceous Earth
If you are one of those who is very cautious about ‘what-goes-inside-their-bodies’, then probably diatomaceous earth is the perfect solution to fight and eliminate the roaches.
It is safe around children and pets and is organic; it causes no harm to humans, and the effects stay longer than any chemical treatment.
Diatomaceous earth is in the form of rock powder with abrasive and absorbent properties.
The pest when comes in contact with it dies as a result of dehydration; the exoskeleton is cut by the abrasive powder and water from the pest’s body is absorbed by it thus killing roaches instantly.
How To Use Diatomaceous Earth
Clean all the potential areas of infestation in your house.
Dry the areas near water sources or wet regions around the house and keep garbage rid; diatomaceous earth does not work on wet areas.
Seal away any opening that could be housing cockroaches.
Now lightly dust a thin layer of the diatomaceous earth in those places.
Make sure you do not make it into a heap as then it would only keep the cockroaches away.
Also, secure around the foundation of the house and keep it dry.
Soapy Water
Spraying roaches with soapy water is the classic case of murder by suffocation.
Cockroaches, too, like any other bug, breathes through the microtubes on their bodies.
Spraying roaches with soapy water creates a thin film of soap around them, blocking the microtubes, which eventually suffocates and kills them instantly.
How To Use Soapy Water
Take a used bottle with a
spraying nozzle.
Mix any detergent with water and
shake it well.
Voila! Your recipe to kill
cockroaches at sight is ready.
However, what needs to be understood is that it is only a temporary solution to the roaches problem; it does not eliminate the hundreds of cockroaches hiding in concealed areas of your house.
Cockroach Traps
Cockroach traps are for the people who advocate no poison policies to deal with the pest problem; it’s clean and easy.
There are basically two kinds of traps- the traps you put at night and come back in the morning to find cockroaches inside the automatic machine trap and the sticky trap killer.
The sticky trap killer is made of a food-based bait, usually left in places where the clan of cockroaches gathers.
It’s easy to use; all you have to do is leave the sticky trap killer open on the ground and wait till the surface of the trap is filled with roaches.
Roach Fogger
If you are looking for a way to disinfect a larger area like a warehouse or an office, a fogger is your solution.
It is an expensive way but an effective one to get rid of a cockroach infestation quickly.
Roach Fogger works by transforming the poison into dry fog particles less than 15 microns in size thus killing roaches instantly.
The fog, which consists of the roach killer components, can percolate into any openings or crevices where no other product can reach.
It takes up to 6 hours to end an infestation and eliminate roaches from the time of its use.
Dry fogging is usually a professional way to deal with pest problems; if you want to do it yourself, you can buy a thermal fogger machine yourself.
On using a good roach fogger, the poison particles rise in the air and then gradually settle.
While settling, they fall onto small cracks and openings and even on ceilings and walls, killing every adult, larva, or ovipositor.
The effect lasts from 40 to 60 days of its use; it provides the best result, the closest to professional extermination.
How To Use The Fogger
It is a toxic pesticide that can cause harm to pets and children and the one using the fogger.
Therefore, before using it, make sure to vacate the place for at least 10 hours and cover your nose with an effective face mask; wear glasses for your eyes and gloves for your hands.
Cover all the food and drinks at home.
Make sure the poison does not come in contact with the skin.
Once the necessary precaution is taken, use a generator of high-temperature dry fog. Ordinary sprayers are not equipped to create dry fog.
Use a high-quality poison and make sure not to use the same poison every time as cockroaches can adapt and develop tolerance too often.
Exterminate Roaches with Licensed Pest Control
While the above-mentioned solutions and products might give you the desired results for some time, it is always recommended to hire a licensed exterminator in the case of a serious and growing roach infestation.
To help you with this, we have curated a personalized Pest Control form that will give you free quotes from multiple exterminators so that you can hire a professional who is worth your money, time, and effort.
And don’t worry, all the personal details that you mention here are 100% safe! Also, by filling the form, at least, you’ll know how much you will have to pay if you take the help of your local exterminators
Final words
No one can deny the various health hazards posed by roaches that can cause many diseases and illnesses.
Therefore it’s important to get rid of these buggers immediately and effectively.
While the above-mentioned alternatives are quite efficient, they might still not work in case of an heavy infestation.
