Yikes I've got ANTS

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petek

petek

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Ontari ari ari O
A few weeks ago I noticed a swarm of teeny tiny itsy bitsy ever so small brown or black ants merrily munching away on a Ruffles that somehow missed my mouth and landed under my computer chair down here in my workshop. Shortly after I set off to ye old local hardware store and bought a bottle of Ant B Gon (not a spelling error) and put a few drops here and there at their point of entry. Boy what a swarm over the next few days as they devoured it. Took about a week to dispatch them. Well a few days later I see another mini swarm munching on one of Parkers kibbles in front of the dryer...out with the Ant B Gon again. No sooner are those gone than I find another swarm in coming up in the sunroom,, more Ant B Gon applied..Next they show up in the ensuite on the main floor so back to the hardware store and I bought some Raid Ant Traps and have laid those all over but now they're back in my workshop where it all began devouring more Ant B Gon and Raid.. Will they ever go away?
 
Buy Chinese Chalk at the dollar store (unless you have pets)...

If not, regular chalk will do (although not as well...)

An ant will not cross a chalk line.
 
Will this work for ants?

Roach-bait balls.

1/4 cup shortening
1/8 cup sugar
8 oz (230ml) 1 cup powdered boric acid
1/2 up flour
water

mix shortening and sugar till creamy
stir boric acid and flour together
add to other (shortening) mixture
pour in enough water to form a soft dough
shape into small balls

Place in areas of infestation.

The boric acid gives beasties gas. Some species can't burp/fart. They explode!

KEEP AWAY FROM CHILDREN AND PETS. KEEP AWAY FROM FOOD.
Takes time to work.
 
I have found the secret for ant control is to keep the home's foundation and surrounding area ant-free. My home has a crawl space on a perimeter concrete foundation, with a 2 to 3 foot cripple wall. Most of the exterior walls are stucco. The ants were coming in from the garden and nesting in the stucco around the screen foundation ventilation openings. From there they would get into the house, looking for water or food.

My solution has been to treat the ventilation openings (about 6" x 12") with liberal applications of diatomaceous earth and boric acid. Both are available at Home Depot. Periodically I look at the outside of the vent openings to see if ants have returned. For sudden outbreaks I'll use a spray insecticide. I find that Ortho "clove scent" works pretty well. For inside the home, I use Safer's organic Cedar oil ant spray. It controls them reasonably well and leave a pleasant cedar aroma.
 
ants

I found that recipe with the borax in an old book from my grand-ma/great-grand-ma:
Mix half powdered boric acid with icing sugar and let them eat it - they will all explode!
Ralf
 
Boric Acid

Yes my Mum also used to put down liberal doses of Boric Acid,called Borax here down under and it worked quite well, she also used it on cockroaches as well.
Cheers.
Steve.
 
Wow, cockroaches even in Australia??

(Somehow, a part of me wants to imagine there is a place on the planet that is immune....)
 
Demon WP (wetable powder). It has a 6 month residual and is safe around pets. It will kill any insect inside your home. I use it, usually just once a year, and I never see bugs in the house. Even kills the mosquitoes that fly in as I come and go out the door. The insects must touch it for it to work. The active ingredient is cypermethrin.

I also use it outside in protected areas like eves and overhangs to prevent wasp nests.
 
Had that problem this summer. I spread some ant control granules around the foundation of the house and put baited traps inside. They were gone in a week.
 
Thank god you do not live in the ocean part of n.j.!

Our place gets them, my moms friends place gets them , my friends place gets them, my dads friends place gets them, I even bet the schools ger them. Our place was built last year and we have ants! When we go up, I just vacuum them up. If you have them, and with out a curious puppy, sprinkle ORECK cristal aroma II on the floor and keep it there. they get the grains and die. At least our place is not beachfront either... we were looking at thoes places they have millions of ants! Our place is in ocean city nj IT IS SOOO BEAUTEFUL THERE! That city is sooooooooooo nice and friendly. I walk downtown all the time and everyone is so friendly almost everyone says hi. It is much better than our main house where it is located!

-a-
 
I like Ocean City as well. My friend lived there while going to culinary school....

Friendly town, mellow people....."dry" town, though, which was a new experience for me!
 
The ants only started coming in once we got that cold snap. I can just imagine they have nests somewhere in the house now. At least they're those tiny tiny ones, not those awful carpenter ants we had in one of our houses growing up. The kind that bite..
 
If these are sugar ants, Walgreens sells a product called "TARO". That's the only place I have ever seen it at. It comes in small traps and you place them near where the ants have been seen and within 24 hours they will be gone. The way it works is that the ants go in the trap and get the Taro on them and take it back to the nest, thereby killing the nest wherever it may be. We had a case of ants in the crew room at one of our destinations and couldn't get rid of them. Finally we put the Taro out and later that afternoon we found a long stream of ants going out of the crew room into the mens room and into a crack in the wall. The next morning, and ever since there have been no more ants.
Since we are talking about bugs, years ago when I was single I lived in an apartment building in Florida that had good insect control. But after a few months some tenants started complaining that they would get sick from the periodic exterimator spraying. So the landlord stopped the prevention exterminator and soon we had roaches everywhere. I had heard that Boric Acid will kill them. So I went into each room, removed one electrical outlet from each wall, dumped in about 4 tablespoons of Boric Acid and then took the vacuum cleaner and put it on "blow" into the hole in the wall. I then replaced the outlet and cover and moved to the next wall. I repeated this process in all the rooms.
Within days I saw no more roaches. In fact I didn't see any more roaches for the next two years I lived there! And my neighbors didn't have any either.
 
Whirlcool is right, Pete.
I get those little tiny ants in my apartment in the middle of winter. First in the bathroom, and then in the kitchen. The bait traps are very effective. The ants are usually gone in a day or two.
The last one that I used was a brand called Hot Shot Maxattrax Ant Bait. I think I got them at Lowe's.
Bill
 

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