We are getting plagued by ants. In previous years I have used a product called Ant Bait at the 3 locations that they could get into the house. Front door, patio door and an air brick under the kitchen units.
However, this year, we can't stop the ants at the patio door. I am loath to use a spray that kills those that transgress, because it means cleaning them up after they are dead. I would rather kill the nest.
I have just come from another forum that has stated that talcum powder will stop the ants from crossing it. I find this very hard to accept. Has anyone any knowledge of this and does it work? More importantly, why does it work?
Never heard of this use of talcum powder, and won't the rain wash it away, presuming that it's put _outside_ the door?
A mixture of borax and sugar (taken back to the nest for food) will supposedly kill the entire nest, and I've heard tell that ants won't cross a strip of copper wire...
Best results so far have been with Nippon ant gel. Put on bit of plastic or tile close to established run. This they take back to nest, but it does take some time for the numbers to dwindle.
I use one of the proprietary antkilling powders Antstop, Doff (I wouldn't like to say what's most effective, as well as baits.
They are messy, but when I see evidence of ants I powder the floor, the floor/wall junctions, under kitchen units etc, and leave it there for days/weeks.
Over several years, this has reduced my ant problem form great heaving masses flying off from three inside rooms (I guess they're in the cavity walls, to one small ant attack this year.
I think it's worth it, but I haven't got a SWMBO to tell me it isn't!
Anne Jackson wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@zetnet.co.uk:
I shoulda made clear I don't powder the whole floor, usually you can tell where they're coming from, so I do all edges, holes, thereabouts.
And the use of baits seems to help, but by the time you see a lot of ants it's too lait for that; so now I have them in areas I know have been active from springtime. From what I _have_ seen of ladies and ant swarms, I think theyd be glad of my methods, but if I can repeat an old graffito which I saw for myself on Liverpool street underground station:
Well, I can't answer for *ladies*, never having had any desire to be one, but as a female I have no fear of ants. I don't even dislike them...they're not 'dirty' creatures (like flies), merely a minor nuisance.
But then, I keep snakes as pets, and ride a motorbike... ;-)
I live in the country and there are lots of the big reddish ants that bite around. For the first time in 25yrs I found some very small ants in the kitchen and some of the red ants coming up behind the skirting board.
I bought a gallon of paraffin and went around all the relevant points outside the house as well as pouring some behind the skirting board. I also bought one of those Nippon baits but it is totally covered so there is no way of seeing if anything is going on.
Anyhow after a couple of days there was just the odd small straggler and after a week or so no sign of any at all and has been so for the past month or so.
Or you just got used to it. This has got to be bad advise for many reasons but if your house burned down any insurance wouldnt pay out as soon as they discovered the accelerant traces.
Anne Jackson wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@zetnet.co.uk:
Well, I ride a bike - Guzzi 750 - in fact I haven't got a car, but I've got to admit that hundreds of thousands of ants swarming and flying indoors gives me the horrors.
If they just wandered around getting a living like the siverfish, woodlice, spiders, crane flies etc I waouldn't mind....
For several years I have been successfully using 'Ant Bait' at the 3 points were they tend to come into the house. However, this year the blighters have got into a corner of the dining room and look to be living in, around and under some recently fitted skirting board. There was what looked like a hairy nest in the corner of the recently fitted laminate floor. I can't describe the nest any better, as it would have meant that I would have had to shift my wife's computer desk and I was keen to watch Dr. Who with my eldest g daughter :-)
I have taken a look outside the house at this location and there is no activity. Not unusual as one of the ant bait units is about 2 foot away. The DPC is below room level and above the patio level.
What I can't understand, is how the hell are they getting into the dining room in the first place?
I am of the same opinion, I just wish that I could convince my wife of that. We have lots of ants in our back garden, the normal ones and lawn ants. Left to her, she would nuke the lot. I think that they play an essential part in the environment.
Wife docent like them either :-( I think they are fascinating creatures. I once went to a hot house in North Somerset and had one draped over my neck. Its head was about a foot above my supporting hand, with its tail trailing on the floor at the other side of me. (It was a constrictor as well) The man who introduced it to me said that it just thought of you as a warm tree, at which point, it lost all its rigidity and relaxed around my shoulders, an amazing feeling though. The highlight of the day was when a tarantula was brought out of its box and was persuaded (after a huge dig in my back from my wife) to walk onto my hand. It was a bit reluctant, as I had used that hand to splash some smelly body stuff on that morning. It felt just like having a pet mouse on my hand. Cold little feet, but just a few more of them :-)
But this is not addressing the ants that are congregating at the corner of a room. There must be well over 500 there, after I sprayed and vacuumed everyone up last night. They don't tend to venture too far, but the corner of the skirting is black for about half an inch each direction :-( It's as if they are feeding on the decorators caulk I put in the corner earlier this year.
I have been down in Portsmouth for the last 6 days and our son phoned me up to say that they were back again. I had been vaccing them up every time they got a few of their friends together. I had an ant bait in the corner, as well :-(
They were down to single figures just before I went South. So I expected them to be gone when I came back.
Our son went and got some talc and very liberally spread it in the corners affected. The fist was in the corner of the dining room and the other was behind the same wall, but in the kitchen.
I am very happy to say that there are now no more ants :-) I just wish that I could have seen how they reacted though.
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