I lived in an OLD house in St. Louis, Missouri for one winter. Sharing the house were one wife, one baby, the landlord and HIS wife....and 21,034,719 cockroaches. 21,034,526 of them lived in crevices in the kitchen. (Having a small grocery store just behind the house made it worse!)

The landlady would turn out the kitchen lights, wait 15 minutes, then turn ON the light, and with a can of Raid in each hand, stomp about, sprying wildly and cursing them. When she was done, a census showed that cockroaches above 2,000,000 population can breed faster than you can kill them using those methods.........we washed all our plates and silverware before AND after using them.

We left there as soon as the college semester was over.

Cockroaches need nothing...they want everything. It sorta puts life in perspective...