Jeßus wrote:
Hi All,
I have a 'slight' ant problem here - never seen anything like it before!
They're getting into anything and everything inside the house, and
unfortunately that's not much of an exaggeration :/
Had the same problem here (WA) 2 or 3 times this year
First time in years that ants were severe inside the house
(House is on stumps,so generally we are pretty well bug free; except
when the cats push the doors open and the flies say "thanks")
They were just the normal small red / brown ones though - if you crush
one, they have a very distinctive smell. Understand that Argentine Ants
do not give off any smell when crushed (from book learning from years
ago; never actually encountered any)
As to what kind of ants... not sure, but they're small (.5mm) and dark
brown to black in colour.
er, 0.5mm or 5 mm?
If the former, I must admit my eyesight does not measure up these days
Anyway, I'll stick to the garden side of the problem:
Basically they are killing off my plants one by one. So far they've
killed off a few beans, some Kohl Rabi and now one of my Dill plants
is terminal.
Ditto with a Rosemary in a pot. One of my Corianders is looking a little
iffy too.
snip garden description
Over the years we have used all sorts of ant powders etc with little
real success. Basically it seems that the easiest thing is to kill off
the odd one and just "wait 'em out". They seem to come and go in cycles.
The one thing we have found to be quite good in eliminating / moving
them on is talcum powder (Johnson's Baby if u are feeling rich;
otherwise any old - read cheapest - homebrand). Basically sprinkle this
in a circle around the ant hole. Seems that the ants track this back
into the nest and (from dim memory) suffocate as the powder coats their
bodies. Can also put some along their trails. We have found this works
as well as anything and (should be) less harmful to the environment.
For vegie plants, perhaps sprinkle a circle around each plant or set of
plants - this of course presupposes that you are not using sprinklers
good luck
giovani