How to Kill Cockroaches in a Home With Kids

Eliminate the roaches’ food and water supply. Place all food in sealed containers. Place all garbage in sealed cans. Empty trash cans inside of the home at least once a day, more if food scraps are inside. Fix leaky faucets or pipes. Regularly clean the home to remove food crumbs that feed roaches. Continue this routine even when roaches are gone.

Place roach sticky traps in areas such as inside cabinets, behind appliances or in rooms to determine what paths roaches take to get in and out of the home. Roaches prefer dark places to travel through. Check dark areas of the home with a flashlight if necessary for piles of roach feces, which appear as black spots. Traps also help monitor the roach population to see if baits are effective. Use traps where children cannot get to them. Warn older children not to touch the traps.

Replace some traps with over-the-counter roach bait stations. Roach baits contain food laced with pesticide. Roaches bring the food back the colony nest and share the food with other roaches. Baits are low-risk pesticides, according to the Illinois Department of Public Health.