Open Forum → Re: what do exterminators use to kill roaches

Boric acid powder is relatively safe (RoachPrufe).

May want to rethink that answer, especially if kids are present in the house.
»www.nlm.nih.gov/medlinep ··· 2485.htm

You don't put it out where the kiddies can lick it, you dust it into cracks and crevices where the roaches come into contact with it. It gets on the roaches bodies and they clean it off themselves which kills them by dehydration when they get it inside them.
"Based on mammal median lethal dose (LD50) rating of 2,660 mg/kg body mass, boric acid is poisonous if taken internally or inhaled. However, it is generally considered to be not much more toxic than table salt."
Boric acid is also is in most fruits you eat.

No chemical fumes from dry boric acid, unlike fumigation bombs and spray petrochemical roach residual insecticides.

Sodium bicarbonate(baking soda) any safer?

You give your roachs Antacid? Clean up the rotten food laying around and you can save yourself a few bucks!

they die from it!

Cockroaches have a very high acid content in their stomachs. When they ingest the sugar, and the baking soda along with it, the subsequent reaction between the soda and their natural make-up results in death.
source »www.servicemagic.com/art ··· 159.html

Just because some page lists it as a "dangerous poison" doesn't mean that it's really that bad. Alcohol, acetone, Chlorox, ammonia, are actually more dangerous than boric acid. As it was already pointed out by PrntRhd, one would need to ingest quite a bit of boric acid for poisoning.