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.

Ant Problems

Ants are one of the biggest pest problems we face both in our homes and outside.

Ants as a insect are the most organized and efficient species in the world. They have amazing communication skills which we still can not understand and are very sensitive to insecticides and traps.

If you are battling ants your problem is often much bigger than the dozen that you can visually see. These are just foragers. The Ant colony is much larger and more complex. If you kill the foragers the colony lives on to fight another day.

The biggest mistake is to randomly spray. This will not solve the problem.

The other mistake is to grab ant bait off the grocery store shelf that is in the same location as the insecticide.

And finally we have to consider the type of ant because some species actually break into new colonies when they are sprayed and loose a few workers.

Ants can move through very tiny cracks in the foundation and around our pipes. They use our electrical system and pipes as super highways.

With all this in mind, can we control them. Yes, but keep in mind we usually win the battles but never the war.