Hot Shot VS. Raid

Comparing the two prices for equal 17.5 oz sized cans of bug spray, Hot Shot Roach & Ant Killer #4 Citrus Scent is about a buck less than Raid Ant & Roach Killer #17 Fragrance Free. Both products are emblazoned with the phrase “Kills on Contact!” and Raid’s bilingual labeling also declares “Ã?¡Mata al Contacto!” Both have bilingual instructions on the can, although the small white print against a colored background is difficult to read.

Is Hot Shot the better bargain because the price was $3.79 versus Raid at $4.79? No! Hot Shot is disappointing in the department of “on contact” killing. Fast moving roaches weren’t even slowed down by Hot Shot Roach & Ant #4 Citrus Scent, even through I sprayed down the area until Hot Shot pooled around the energetically swimming cockroach.

Perhaps Hot Shot is made from safer poisons and that the phrase “on contact” doesn’t mean instantly. It is possible that marketing might have found that Hot Shot users may achieve a sense of Schadenfreude with the cruel revenge of a slow painful death befitting the trespassing palmetto bug.

I sprayed down an abandoned chair and covered it with a shower curtain with Hot Shot Roach & Ant Killer #4 Citrus Scent. Four months later, tore apart the chair in preparation for reupholstery. The chair used to be inundated with roaches, and there were still a few hardy ones still living deep within the hidden seams.

The citrus scent of Hot Shot made me sneeze repeatedly, but resulted in clearing of my chronically clogged sinuses – which could be seen as a benefit. Active ingredients listed are .025% Prallethrin and .01% lambda-cyhalothrin. Hot Shot Roach & Ant killer #4 has a longer lasting residue of 12 weeks versus 4 weeks of effectiveness with Raid Ant & Roach killer #17.

To those who belong to the marketing segment that seeks gratification of witnessing an immediate knock down effect on roaches, then use Raid Ant and Roach Killer #17 which contains .1% Imiprothrin and .1% Cypermethrin. Although Raid’s labeling proclaims Fragrance Free, (Sin Fragancia), the odor still lingers – long after spraying.

There is no one single “Avenging Angel of Death” for the most despised vermin that is able to spawn over half a million descendants in one year. Earthworks is protesting the use of pesticides in schools, linking insecticides with asthma. Roaches cast off waste matter that is in itself – an asthma trigger. Scientific studies need to be done that separate the two asthma triggers rather than stopping pesticide use completely, based on circumstantial interpretation. Speculation is that the hotel in Hong Kong with the SARS outbreak might have been spread from rats and cockroaches that traveled within the electrical and ventilation conduits.

Cockroaches are not a sign of bad housekeeping. Even the most vigilant stewardship of a clean kitchen is ineffective if fail to tape up all cracks in walls and cabinetry. A complete sealing of tape and then paint isn’t going to seal off all openings – even with doorways equipped with threshold rubber bumper and door skirts will merely stem the influx.

Roaches Wanted!

The Houston Museum of Natural Science entomology is giving out a bounty of one quarter for each live roach at the Cockrell Butterfly Center on May 15 from 4-7 p.m. for a new exhibit debut. A woman made $9.75 by scattering dog food in the bottom of 5-gallon plastic bucket and pushing it up against a wall.

Around food, use a homemade spray of diluted bleach to stun the quick pest long enough to crush them. Non poisonous mechanical insecticides are boric acid or diatomaceous earth and bugs never develop an immunity against it.