it looks like i'm struggling to keep up with blogging. there has been alot going on here, none-the-least adjusting to having my sister living with us, and rebuilding my life to match her needs. short story. we have cockroaches now, and she and my dad have been hiding poison bate stations everywhere. I already had the hardest time with my dad and rodenticide, and it doesn't look like i will get the time to finish designing my stinkbug traps, let alone a new trap for cockroaches. roaches really seem to like water, which now we have alot of since my sister has basically filled her room with with houseplants using semi-hydro / leca method. despite their strongest efforts, i kinda expect we aren't going to poison our way out of this roach problem, but i do expect we will spread poison around in the house. i seem to recall reading the half-life of some of these compounds in an environment is something like months to years[1]? anyway, my barn hideaway is still a construction zone, and i haven't had time to process through my recent browser tabs, however there was this BBC article the other day about the rise of thyroid cancer globally which did mention a possible connection to pesticides: https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20251114-why-are-thyroid-cancer-cases-increasing-across-the-world "...other scientists suspect that "endocrine disrupting chemicals" (EDCs) found in common household products and organic pesticides could be responsible..." this sort of meshed with some of what i read recently stating some insecticide commonly used in roach bate stations cause tumors in mice. worth noting my sister is moving in with us following a bout with cancer. it's not certain there is a conection, but knowing what i know about the way she lived, it is kinda concerning the way things are changing around my parents' house now. perhaps i just need to suck it up and move out on my own, however i was sort of living here because of my own problems which i'm still working to overcome, and the past few months have certainly not improved things in that respect. oh, here are my insecticide tabs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fipronil#Toxicity "...The United States Environmental Protection Agency has classified fipronil as a group C (possible human) carcinogen based on an increase in thyroid follicular cell tumors in both sexes of the rat. However, as of 2011, no human data are available regarding the carcinogenic effects of fipronil..." http://npic.orst.edu/factsheets/archive/fiptech.html "...Researchers administered fipronil to rats at doses of 0, 0.5, 1.5, 30.0, and 300.0 ppm in the diet for nearly two years and observed increased incidence of benign and malignant follicular cell tumors in the thyroid gland for both sexes at the highest dose tested..." https://downloads.regulations.gov/EPA-HQ-OPP-2005-0206-0010/content.pdf "...The study demonstrated that fipronil is carcinogenic to rats at doses of 300 ppm in males (12.68 mg/kg/day) and females (16.75 mg/kg/day)... ...possible human carcinogen..." gotta love https://www.sciencedirect.com/unsupported_browser https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roach_bait "Roach bait is a pest control method used for the extermination of cockroaches in indoor locations. This method of pest control exploits the cannibalistic and coprophagic tendencies of cockroaches... ...Cockroaches live in nests. Therefore, killing a few roaches that happen to wander into a trap is an inadequate means of controlling the pest. Even if all adult roaches outside the nest are killed, some live eggs will remain in the nest and eventually hatch, leading to exponential growth... ...To control colonies the roach bait may contain the active ingredients Fipronil .05% or Hydramethylnon 2%. Also there are indoxacarb versions..." so, it appears the whole concept is to contaminate the environement with toxified roach carcases, and basically make the area so toxic that no bug can live, and poisoning other species in the process. dead roaches pile up in the "harborage" which is basically all the nooks and crannies of your house. i already have a problem with stinkbugs doing this every year, and i already know that dead bugs piled up in hidden parts of your home is a wonder for gernerating volitile organics and making poor indoor air quality. isn't this just creating a bigger problem to solve later? shouldn't the strategy be to remove what they eat and drink? I understand that this strategy my not work in some cases where you don't have control over neighbors(or sister) who are potentially feeding the roaches or the roaches come in from from neighbor(city problem), but even in that case, wouldn't it be better to handle the actual food source problem? i've been living here in the sticks for 10+ years now, and this is the first time i've had to deal with roaches. i would prefer not to toxify my house and local neck of the woods. obviously there is some natural method, since cockroaches don't live in the woods or migrate through it. what is the solution? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydramethylnon looks like pretty bad stuff: http://npic.orst.edu/factsheets/archive/hydratech.pdf "...Rats were dosed with 200 and 400 ppm hydramethylnon over the course of two generations to determine reproductive effects. Male rats were less inclined to mate, and evidence of testicular degeneration occurred at all but the lowest dose. Fewer females became pregnant and implantation rates were reduced (11).... ...Hydramethylnon primarily affectsthe testes (12). Rats exposed to high levels of hydramethylnon may have prostate atrophy, testicular degeneration, and germ cell damage (11). Exposures of this magnitude may also result in small, soft testes of reduced weight (1)... ...Holstein calves given 113.5g of a product composed of 0.5% hydramethylnon in treated corn each day for 7 weeks developed significant leukopenia, lymphopenia, eosinopenia (13)... ...Hydramethylnon was administered to rats in their diet for 2 years. Rats at the highest dose level (200 ppm) developed tumors in the uterus and adrenals. The magnitude of this dose is not considered to be relevant to human exposures (1). See box on Cancer.... ...Mice given hydramethylnon in their diets had significant increases in lung adenomas and carcinomas at 50 and 100 ppm (1)... ...The EPA has classified hydramethylnon as a possible (group C) human carcinogen due to lung adenomas and carcinomas (1). This classification means that, although hydramethylnon has been shown to cause cancer in one strain or sex of a laboratory animal, there is inadequate or no evidence that it may cause cancer in humans (1)... ...Hydramethylnon adsorbs strongly to soils and has low water solubility. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency does not anticipate that hydamethylnon will contaminate groundwater (1)... ...The soil half-life of hydramethylnon ranges from 375-391 days in aerobic soil... ...Biota in soil can increase the degradation rate of hydramethylnon. White rot fungus (Phanaerochaete chrysosporium) breaks down hydramethylnon, resulting in a half-life of 14-25 days (7). The half-life in sandy loam soil ranges from 7-28 days (10)..." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indoxacarb "...Methemoglobinemia (also known as blue baby syndrome) is a condition which ultimately decreases the effectiveness of red blood cells to exchange oxygen with organs..." https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2738321/ https://web.archive.org/web/20080117122846/http://www.epa.gov/opprd001/factsheets/indoxacarb.pdf "Indoxacarb has been classified as a “not likely” human carcinogen. Neurotoxicity was observed in severalstudies in both rats and mice. It is characterized by weakness, head tilting, and abnormal gait or mobility withinability to stand. Some of these signs occurred at fatal doses. There was no evidence of susceptibility fromeither in utero or neonatal exposure to both rat and rabbit young. A developmental study was used to determinedthe acute dietary endpoint for females 13 - 50 years of age based on decreased fetal body weight. The compoundis negative for mutagenicity. The compound(s) was extensively metabolized and the metabolites were eliminatedin the urine, feces and bile in rats. The metabolite profile was dose dependent and varied quantitatively betweenmales and females. The metabolic pathway proposed yielded multiple metabolites bearing one of the two ringstructures, the indeno or trifluoromethoxyphenyl groups. Additional details are provided in Table 5. A summaryof the toxicological endpoints used for risk assessment are provided in Table 6" Reading up on pesticides is tireing me out. i guess indoxacarb is not mutagenic, though it seems to be neurotoxic to mammals. i'm not getting paid to research all this stuff, and i've got other stuff i need to do. i really think there must be a better way to handle these kind of problems than poison. or maybe there isn't. from the standpiont of someone living in the city it probably seems pretty hopeless, unless you miraculously figure out a way to get everyone to clean up all their trash and their neighbor's trash. i guess that is not really all that different from my current situation: my "roomates" like stuff that attracts roaches, and now that they have been introduces... maybe there is someone out there who has already come up with a solution, however it looks like, especially when it comes to invasive pests, the options can be limited. however, i think, if it's an indoor pest, deny it access to food and water is probably a good start. i don't know how we will conquer this problem at my house given all the potted plants and aquarium here. maybe i will figure something out? BTW, i found my ag-pesticide tabs(non-roach-related): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neonicotinoid#Market note, i'm not sure what they are spraying in the orchard around here, though i have noticed they are doing it more the past 2 years for lanternflies, and i have noticed an absence of honeybee swarmsin the woods since then. https://www.xerces.org/pesticides/understanding-neonicotinoids https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbaryl note tic treatemt for dogs kills aquatic life https://www.newscientist.com/article/2482650-dogs-pollute-water-with-pesticides-even-weeks-after-flea-treatment/ paywayll, and so i'm not sure if this is just for so-called spot-on treatemnts or also included edibles https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluralaner https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permethrin [1] i think i actually read this fact about a rodenticide, but the same principle stands