I posted the following to alt.lawn.home.garden, with little response. So I thought I'd try here...
We live in the Arizona desert near Phoenix and have a significant problem with large black ants in the yard. We have had exterminators (costly), but they were only successful for a period of time before the ants returned.
I had read somewhere that one could make a solution of water, sugar, and borax (boric acid?), which was an effective poison for ants. The problem is that I don't know the proportions that should be used.
Can anyone here help with this? Are there other homemade options that I don't know about? We're trying to steer clear of commercial products, and also stay as "green" as possible.
Its nice to "Stay Green" but you have to look at it from the side of going to war with the Ants. We live up in Indiana with alot of large oaks in the yard. We fight ants all the time.
If your going to really control them then you should get some type of poison that they carry back to the nest and kill the others. Especially the queen.
Probably the reason the exterminators where only successful for a period of time is because they didnt use something that would be taken back to the nest to destroy the queen and such.
We use the stakes you put in the ground with the poison in them. Havent seen too much of the ants after we started this. Takes a week or so.
That "take it back to the nest and destroy the queen" thing is largely a myth. You can teach the ants not to eat that particular food but the colony (or one of the princesses) will survive and they won't be eating that bait anymore. I had the ants so well trained here the only thing they would eat was dog food the dog had chewed on, then I baited with that. Then they just walked around and I never really saw them eating anything. Finally I tracked down the nest and dosed them with Ortho Ant and Termite ... with extreme prejudice. (3 gallons of mix at label strength) I haven't seen them for a while now.
According to what I read about using the water/sugar/boric acid solution, it's supposed to be taken back to the nest to feed the queen. In theory it should work.
Supposedly they did use such a product, but it certainly wasn't permanent.
What sort of stakes did you use? I'm not familiar with them.
Ants are not the dominant species on the planet by accident.
Pussyfooting around with ants is likely to make the problem worse. When a colony is placed under significant stress it will subdivide to assure survival. You might see fewer ants for a while, then they'll come roaring back in greater numbers.
Thanks, but unless I'm misreading this, I can't purchase this product unless I'm a professional. We've had professionals for 2 years. If treatment is ongoing, I have to find a way to do it myself.
Borax and boric acid are two totally different things. You want boric acid. The proportions of water/sugar/boric acid aren't particularly important. I prefer using 50/50 flour and boric acid with enough water to make a paste. After drying, either crush it to small pellets and put them where the ants are and go or just leave it as a cake and put those cakes in a few strategic places.
Thanks! Interesting twist to what I've been reading on the 'net. BTW, what's the diference between Borax and boric acid? I thought they were the same thing.
The commercial baits like Terro are more like 12 parts food to one part Boric Acid. The thought is you don't want to kill them too fast or you will just get a few before they stop eating it. There are a lot of ants that actually maintain several different food supplies in each colony. When one group dies they abandon that food steam avoid that food. I haven't seen a sugar eating ant around here in years. Terro got all of them. Even the white foot ant, that is supposed to be sugar eating, eats proteins here. That is the nasty little bastard that throws queens all the time. We also have a fire ant that will take orphan ants from other colonies. The lack of a hard freeze makes ants a 12 month problem in Florida
Andro ant bait (and some others) work quite well and will kill the colony.
Wayne, you can try all the borax and homemade remedies you want, but unless you find nests and use an effective pesticide you'll have a continuing infestation.
Judicious use is obviously the key to being politically correct as well while still managing to control the problem.
You will, of course, never be able to entirely eliminate all ants but it should be possible to find dens of the large ants or at least their working trails and baiting them will eliminate the high numbers pretty effectively.
We have the large red ants here -- it's a continual battle as it's a farmstead surrounded by over a mile of unbroken native grass in all directions (so the ground isn't tilled to help disturb the critters). I carry a shaker w/ me on the tractor when mowing around the outbuildings and corral, etc., and eliminate new colonies as I find them. That keeps them pretty much from establishing new colonies inside the actual yard area itself. The little ants for the most part I ignore unless they think it's time to move into the house. I've never had a pinch of Andro fail to stop them in that case, either, altho the wife will use the borax thingie for weeks w/ little real effect before I'll (usually surreptitiously) spike her efforts. Then next morning she'll usually remark she "won"... :)
HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here.
All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.