Ants in the Winter

Due to the fact our warm homes create false environments, I still do a lot of ant control in the winter.

Keep to the same check list we discussed earlier in checking pipes and cracks in the area between the floor and walls. These ants are probably living near a heat source such as a refrigerator or water heater so treat those areas nearest to the ant movement and that heat source.

An ants normal habitat would be to hibernate, so if we see activity there has to be heat fooling their natural senses. A warm home or crawl space can easily do that. However they are going to focus in the heated area and not travel out of it.

Baits are still best in this situation in that the nest is often very hard to get to if it is behind the wall near the stove or something similar.

Reoccurring Ant problem

If you are getting ant reoccurring in the exact same area such as the pantry molding or above the sink it's not because you are not a good cleaner but the fact ants can find trails.

As more and more ants travel the same area they will leave a scent and sign that other ants will follow even though you killed the head scouts and workers last week.

Instead of spraying the ants and killing just a few of the ones you can see right now, use a good quality ant bait (quality level is discussed in an earlier blog post here).

It is important you DO NOT spray near the bait though. The ants are smart enough to recognize the spray as toxic and will not take that back to the nest. That is the key goal here, to provide a better, easier to carry bait than drew them into your kitchen area in the first place.

Often these indoor ants are small. So grind the bait granule to a size you think will be attractive to them. NOT a dust because that would not be enough to be worth carrying back to the nest, but small enough to get in small spaces.

I had a Pet Clinic with a problem in one area that  no one seemed to be able to stop. I laid on my side watching them for an hour, followed their foraging path and found that they were trying to get under a piece of molding that was very tight to the floor. There was discarded large granules all around the area as they gave up and went back for something that would fit. I ground the bait until it was a size they could get into the nest and have not had a problem there since.

So if you are having a reoccurring ant problem, you need to find a way to be ready to kill that nest and any new nest that arise with the right size ant bait for the right size ant.

How to stop ants

How to stop ants from coming into your home.

Ants are continually searching for food and water sources. They literally surround your home in nature living in a subterranean protected environment sending out soldiers and scouts to find food. Homes are often built on ant nests unknowingly and a queen can fly into a vent and nest under your home. But the most common way for a ant to get under your house is through a crack in the foundation.

This crack is more than adequate for an ant army to move into your home. The way to prevent this usually is not to try and repair the foundation. Repairs in this kind of cement always seem to pull apart or separate slightly which is all the ant needs to get through.

Your only real line of defense is to spray the foundation with a product labeled to kill ants and for use on a house foundation.

Many of the spider barrier products can help in that ants will not want to cross that barrier. They sense the chemical and do not want to get infected and return that infection back to the nest. This is only partially effective though as I have witnessed over the past twenty years in the business. About ten percent of the ants will still try to get through. This means you need a powerful enough insecticide to kill that ant as he tries to enter.

Most home defense type products break down very quickly in full sun light. So you will have to re-spray a crack like this every few weeks to insure the chemical is active and will stop them.

Once under the house, baits really are the only option that will wipe out the colony. Granular baits will often have a label that will allow this. It depends on the house and what access is under the house but this is the way to stop ants.

Ants in Bathroom

Why are there ants in my bathroom?

Why do ants end up in the bathroom where there is no food source?

The answer is water. This is true with spiders, cockroaches, earwigs and other insects. They still need water to survive.

The next reason we discussed earlier, the great insect highway system running through your home called the plumbing system. They were attracted to moisture as your pipes "sweat" and that will sustain them on long journeys as they forage for food.

Once in your bathroom, they often fall into the sink or tub and can not get out due to the slickness of the porcelain or tile.

How do you get rid of them? Well the bathroom is not the best place to be spraying because you will be walking around in it barefoot. A crack and crevice spray may be okay if the label states that, but again, it can't be where water will conduct it into the tub or sink where you may come in contact with it.

The traps we discussed can be used but again they need to be fresh. Another option is a ant gel that can stick up under the sink where you and your pets can not come in contact with it. This gel is another ant bait that they will take back to the nest.

Caulking the area around the pipes will help but you will see trails of ants often coming into the bathroom. This is because the moisture is attracting them. In nature moisture will bring in other insects and plant debris that ants will use as food. So if they sense moisture it is like the lion going to the watering hole to find out if there is any prey. Keeping the bathroom as dry as possible will help.

Again, remember the bathroom is a sensitive area to do any kind of spray or even bait, so always carefully read the label and follow the directions.

Ant Baits Do Not Work

As a professional licensed exterminator, I often get the call to eliminate ants in a home or business. When I get there I will see these little "Ant Hotels" and the customer will say, "we tried these but they don't seem to work."

Ants will be walking right on by the bait station ignoring it.

The problem is the freshness of the bait. Ants are amazingly intelligent, and especially sensitive to taking anything back to the colony that could hurt it.

When I store my bait in the same location as my pesticide, they will not take the bait. The ants are so sensitive that if there is any sense of a chemical that is not right associated with that bait station, they pass.

So grocery stores and box stores will put pesticide and bait right in the same isle along with herbicides like 2,4-d which we smell when we walk into the isle. If we can smell it, then it has definitely effected the ant hotel. I know that seems hard to believe, but it is the truth.

If you buy a spider barrier product and spray the ants first, then put in the hotels, again, they will not work. If you purchase a bait that has been on the shelf for two years, the effectiveness is greatly reduced.

My bait smells so sweet it's almost sickly sweet when it comes out of the container. The ants pick it up almost as quickly as it hits the ground. That is what you should be seeing.

It takes fresh bait, and fresh bait is very effective. So do not purchase Ant Bait from a store that has it in the same area as the pesticides and herbicides. Your best bet is to purchase it from an online direct wholesaler that only deals in bait and has product that was recently manufactured.

When using Ant Bait Granular, more is not better. For some reason pouring out a pile will actually turn them off from the bait. Small scattered amounts spread out over their foraging route works best.
Always follow label instructions.

As a way to stop ants, baits actually are the best, but it takes time. You have to be patient and allow the ants to still scurry about your kitchen or bathroom area as they work on taking the bait back to the nest. Then you need to wait a few days for the nest to be fed and for the chemical to take effect. If you don't have that patience, you are back to spraying. But when you spray you are only killing a few foragers and scouts, not the main nest. Which means with the next hatchlings you'll have ants again.

So the best thing to do is bait and be patient for it to work. So long as you know your bait is good.

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How Ants get into your Home

Welcome to the Ant Freeway network 101

Ants will take the path of least resistance when foraging for food and water sources. In nature this may be a tree limb giving them fast access over the jungle they live in called our lawn. But then they encounter an amazing straight road paved like a freeway and slightly moist providing water.

This straight freeway leads them into a structure with a network of highways leading to amazing food and water and protection from predators, called, your home.

The pipes within your house are perfectly suited for their travel needs. They run on the straightest course, are easy to hang onto and have few if any predators guarding them.

The access point usually is a garden hose that we conveniently ran out to their location in the yard and might as well have put up a sign saying, come on in.

This is how ants get into your home. The scouts go back to the main colony and this hose becomes a main freeway running both directions, in and out of your house.

This is why you see ants in your bathroom but not in the hallway. Ants need moisture, and at the end of every freeway ramp they find a water source. Just couldn't be better.

So how do we interrupt this convenience? Caulk around your hose bibs and around all the pipe that runs through a wall in your house. This will help and will also slow down mice, cockroaches and spiders that have been enjoying the same paths.

The next thing is to use a ant repellent spray or even a spider barrier product with ants on the label and coat the pipe right where the ant would come in on the pipes.

You may still have ants. This is because you didn't do the preventive early enough and now a queen followed the highway and set up a colony within the house. This is going to take a fresh bait (not store bought) that the foragers will take back to the queen and larvae which will wipe out the colony.

Ants will use limbs touching the top of your roof, the wiring inside your house, cracks in the foundation so always be on the lookout for ways they may be using to access your home.

How Ants Think

Can something with that small a cranium really think?

 

Well we know it is not the kind of cause and effect mammal brains use but they definitely are thinking in a collective brain sense.

 

Ants have the ability to reason out a problem. If you don't believe this, put one ant in a maze and see if it can find its way out. Amazingly, it will. Or as an easy test, put a large block in front of an ant path and see how long it takes to find another way around it.

 

This is a reasoning skill with a directive that seems to be pre-programmed at the time of birth. How does one ant know it is a forager, another a soldier, another a queen? Do they look in the mirror or go to a psychologist to try and find themselves? Nope, they know from day one what their role in the colony is and they do that role without question. 

 

This is important if we are going to keep them out of our homes and our picnic area. If they have a pre-programmed thought pattern then we can use that to our advantage to steer them away from our area.

 

The problem is food. Food is what we like and food is what they are after. So the first step is examining our eating habits and how we clean. I have had people say, "well it is a sign of a messy house to have ants," and then those same people get ants and are appalled. They stress how clean they are and how they constantly vacuum. But still the ants show up.

 

This is because the ants are on a pre-programmed schedule and you are in their path. That kitchen has so many attractants that you are not even aware is important to the ant. One is moisture. Are you so clean you don't allow any moisture around your sink area? Of course not, so you have already provided one important source.

 

The next thing is, what is clean? Just because I can't see it does not mean the ant can't find it. They are into the microscopic world you and I can not see. So there is no real way to ever be THAT clean.

 

This means the battle will have to be taken to the chemical level, right? Actually there is a lot of good organic control on ants. But to truly win with organic it often gets messy. We will compare organic and chemical control options.