The Vernal Equinox is supposed to be March 20th, and if you’ve studied astronomy, you know that’s true. I myself reckon the first day of Spring from the date of appearance of the first indoor roach of the year. That was today. I was watching MSNBC, and Kedi jumped up on the back of my recliner. She reached out to the left sidelight of the French doors facing the deck and stretched out to make herself as long as she could. Cats have excellent high-frequency hearing; they hear things that we do not. For one, they can hear roaches.
Her reach was insufficient to permit her to lay a paw on the monster. It was ~4 cm in length by visual examination. I don’t know about where you live, but Austin is a high tech, Silicon Gulch, Mecca, and our roaches come in Metric. If I had had a digital caliper, I would be giving a more accurate measurement. Alas, I did not have one at hand.
I gave it a couple of sprays of Zevo that I keep close at hand for these intrusions. Zevo is more useful than a digital caliper in these circumstances. It was stunned and fell to the floor. I think that this plant-based bug spray messes with the bugs’ spiracles rather than their nervous systems. They probably die of asphyxia.
Kedi said that she heard it utter the roach equivalent of Et Tu Brute as it crawled away. Tomorrow, after tonight’s forecast thunderstorms, I will sprinkle a generous line of Boric acid along the thresholds of all the doors that lead outside. Spring is here!