Best method for killing ants. Any ideas?

[prolesunited]

Spring has arrived and so have our unwelcome guests.

So, how do we kill them all. I'm talking colonies here that dot the yard and have invaded the house. They are small black ones.

[democracyindanger]

1. A dozen 9-year-olds armed with magnifying glasses.

[prolesunited]

3. Boy, they would have a field day

But we don't want to violate child labor laws.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

2. A pack of aardvarks.

[Roon]

4. If they are the black sugar ants

those pesticide disks work very, very,well.

[magpie]

5. You don't have to kill them...

Ants hate cinnamon. When they come in, find their trail and place a cinnamon stick across it. The ants will not cross over cinnamon. The next day, place another stick further along on their trail closer to where they are coming in. A few well placed detour cinnamon sticks that eventually end outside with a final detour leading into the yard or something... They will stay away until next year, at least. If you prefer to kill them, then simply use the cinnamon sticks to detour them into vats of poison or something. I prefer just the detour- and cinnamon is safe for pets and babies.

[Random_Australian]

9. Cinnamon?

We always use Mint!

[shanti]

15. can't you just sprinkle

powdered cinnamon along the trail?

[magpie]

19. Aha!! I knew someone would post something like this.

It is why I haven't posted much since joining DU. I post my fairly liberal way with cinnamon STICKS and some progressive has to pipe up with 'sprinkled powder'. Go ahead, try the powder. The sticks can be easily moved from the left to center to right of the trail. The powder would be just this new, messy way of dealing with something. But go ahead. I knew I shouldn't have posted. I knew someone would want to take issue with sticks and suggest powder....

[shanti]

25. LOL

[khashka]

49. True.... but

also take your leftovers away from your house. And drop them on the ground.

The cinnamon will make them want to avoid your house, leftover food trailing away from your house will lead them away.

But if nothing else works - pour gasoline on the ant hill.


Why did I say that? I LOVE ants!


Khash.

[Kali]

6. I use diatomacious earth in my doorways

and don't worry too much about the yard. It is "natural" and works in a mechanical way, but still has some danger - don't breath it in etc. And if it gets wet you have to reaply. It works but is a bit messy.

I have used traps too, but they seem to work better on roaches than ants. (and I hate to use poisons)

[Breeze54]

7. Put out dry ...

oatmeal around the top of the ant nest and the workers will carry it to the queen.
She'll eat it and drink water, the oatmeal will expand and the queen will explode.
The colony will die and/or move away to another queen...
at least it worked for me and fire ants in the southwest!

[amerikat]

8. spray some vinegar where they live.

They will move away. Non toxic and it works.

[Minnesota Libra]

10. Take your choice between.......

.....good old generic bleach or white vinegar. I like the bleach better though, it works faster and longer. In fact you can put some undiluted bleach in a spray bottle or a squeeze dish soap bottle and reapply when needed.

[tinfoilinfor2005]

11. You wait until it is pitch black night. Then you go to the nest and

shine in a flashlight. Then you stick an oatmeal cookie in the hole of the nest. You do that for four nights. On the fifth night, you wait until pitch blackness. Then you go to the nest armed with your flashlight and a hammer. You shine in your flashlight and now you wait. One minute, two, three, four...then suddenly a little head pops out of the hole and hollers "WHERE'S MY COOKIE?"

WHACK!

[Blue-Jay]

12. Ants, not baboons.

That trick always works on baboons.

Mandrills, however, are WAY too smart to fall for that.

[tinfoilinfor2005]

13. The original joke is aimed at getting a tape worm

and you know where you stick the cookie?

Very handsome Mandrill, and I don't say that to just any monkey.

[shanti]

14. when you find out, PLEASE let me know!

sacramento was built on an anthill, i swear! when it rains, the hordes come.

[sakabatou]

16. Borax

Ants will cross it, unless other ants make a "bridge" out of the dead ones.

[laylah]

35. However,

should you be applying the borax in the yard or another area where things grow, it will render the soil useless for literally years!

Jenn

[sakabatou]

36. That's why we do it for indoors only

[madrchsod]

17. cayenne pepper kills ants

..spread it along their path and dump a bunch where they live. cheap,enviro friendly,and effective

[Deja Q]

18. A dollop of honey on the tile. A few hours off of work. And a heavy shoe

Wait for the ants to dig into the honey then squish the lil' buggers to Kingdom Come.

[Pale Blue Dot]

20. Instant grits. They eat it and blow up. nt

[SongOfTheRayne]

30. ...

[GoddessOfGuinness]

21. ...

[BrotherBuzz]

22. Boric acid mixed with a little corn syrup

and when lucky enough to score it, Chinese ant chalk works well. I think it might be illegal because the man at the Asian market hides it under his counter and you need to ask for it, and he only understands you if asked quietly.

[hfojvt]

23. I hope you are not killing them in your yard

That seems uncalled for. A few thousand ants are not as bad as poisoning a whole yard. Unless they start building big mounds or something. I am not sure if the little red ant traps work, but that is what I have always used.

[Blue-Jay]

24. I am going to nuke the yard.

No ants, termites, grasshoppers, bunnies, bears, etc. will want to come within 5 miles of our yard. It's total war. They task me, and I will have them. No quarter asked, none given. I'm laying down enough poison to cause a new wave of Canadian flipper-babies to be unleashed upon an unsuspecting world.

[hfojvt]

26. you know that's gonna kill

the squirrels and the skunks too?

[Blue-Jay]

27. Fuck 'em. They are the ones who sided with the ants.

It's "total war". Sun Tzu will be my guide in wiping out the vermin. I will annihilate the little ant-women, ant-children, ant-aunts, and ant-uncles. The squirrels are either with me or against me! (I hope they're with me, though.)

[hfojvt]

28. Actually, before the squirrels go

The cardinals and purple martins and robins and blue jays will go.

[tigereye]

41. " Sun Tzu will be my guide in wiping out the vermin. "

[Jamastiene]

29. Dry grits mixed with a pinch of sugar.

The sugar will attract them. They will carry the grits back home for later. They will eat some of the dry grits on the way. Soon as it rains or they drink water, kerplow, their stomachs will pop open. No more ants. It does work. I never knew ants had stomachs before, but I guess they do. Hm.

[ET Awful]

31. Fire.

Definitely fire. You have to burn the little buggers out. Then you have to dig fire trenches to keep them from advancing.

Well hey, it works for army ants.

[radfringe]

32. my grandmother

would put down used coffee grounds around the foundation of home to act as a barrier

we were "invaded" a few years back - so I started doing coffee grounds - it works

[nuxvomica]

33. A mixture of honey, baking yeast and water in jar lids

Set them out along known ant trails. The ants will drink their fill, return to the nest and kill all the other ants with their yeast infection.

[ashling]

34. This method works for fire ants - you have to kill the queen

First sprinkle snuff all over the mound....











the ants will take it into the colony and feed it to the queen....












when she comes out to spit, hit her with a hammer.

[twenty2strings]

37. Destroy world ecosystem...

But we'll have to be thorough.

[pitohui]

38. you can't kill them

you only move 'em around

[prolesunited]

42. As long as they move out of our house

I'm fine with that.

Thanks for all of the suggestions.

[Orsino]

39. Dust off, and nuke the site from orbit.

It's the only way to be sure.

Seriously, diatomaceous earth seems to control ants without killing them off entirely, and without poison.

[tigereye]

40. it never takes long does it, once it gets warm?

ant baits?

[CatholicEdHead]

43. Why would you want to kill ants?

<Begin Guilt Trip>
http://www.folkmusic.com/record/r_stand.htm#Hey_Little_...

Hey Little Ant
words and music by Phil & Hannah Hoose

This is the biggest little song I know.

Vocals: John & Catie Curtis

Hey Little Ant, down in that crack
Can you hear me? Can you talk back?
See my shoe? Can you see that?
Oh now it's gonna squish you flat.

(gasp)! Please oh please do not squish me
Spare my life and let me be
I'm on my way home with a crumb of pie
Please don't squish me, don't make me die.

Oh anyone knows that an ant can't feel,
You're so tiny you don't seem real.
I'm so big and you're so small
I don't think it'll hurt at all.

Yeah - well you are a giant and giants can't
Know how it feels to be an ant.
Come down close and you will see
That you are quite a lot like me.

Are you crazy? Me? Like you?
Why I've got a home and a family too.
You're just a speck that runs around.
No one'll care if my foot comes down.

Oh big friend you are so wrong
My nest mates need me because I am strong.
I dig our nest, feed baby ants too
I must not die beneath your shoe.

Yeah well my mother says that ants are rude.
They carry off our picnic food.
They steal our chips and our bread crumbs too.
Who cares if I kill a crook like you?

Hey I'm not a crook, kid, read my lips.
Sometimes ants need crumbs and chips.
Why, one of your chips feeds my whole town
You must not let your foot come down.

Yeah, but all my friends squish ants each day
Squishing ants is a game we play.
They're looking at us, they're listening too.
They all say - I should squish you!

Well I can see you're big and strong
Decide for yourself what's right and wrong.
But if you were me and I were you
What would you want me to do?

Should the ant get squished? Should the ant go free?
It's up to the kid, not up to me.
So we'll leave that kid with the raised up shoe
What do you think that kid should do?
<End Guilt Trip>

[prolesunited]

44. They are swarming

and I would have to stomp around for a long time to get rid of them all.

I refuse to share my home with bugs and rodents. They can live free, just not here.

[khashka]

50. You don't live in Texas, do you?

As a man who cries like a baby when killing insects (pathetic, eh?), ants ain't so friendly here. Fire ant bites hurt like hell and then develope into blisters that seep pus and sometimes leave scars....

A little mayhem might be justified. Hell, I never bit one of them!

Khash.

[maveric]

45. A can of hair spray and a bic lighter.

The "Flame Thrower" method worked great when I was a kid.

[carpetbagger]

46. Boy, you've just given me some Yankee homesickness.

Down here I actually view infestation with black ants as a good sign, one that means the fire ant numbers have gone down. I'm hoping that a demonstration project a few miles away involving small aphid flys that prey on fire ants will reach over into my neighborhood.

Black ants are cool.

[prolesunited]

47. Tell you what

I'll ship you a colony or two.

Is it legal to ship ants across state lines?

[carpetbagger]

54. It's probably both illegal and futile.

They'd be fire ant-lunch in short order. I am, however, headed up north in June, so I'll get to see them, as well as grass you can actually sit in, and the other things I miss most (Drake's Cakes, decent pizza and bagels, hemlock/rhododendron thickets, places where history is something other than the 1950s, White Castle, democrats, shade, you get the point).

[Parrcrow]

48. Irish folk dancing

[arwalden]

51. Careful... Watch Out For "People For The Ethical Treatment Of Ants"

... they might come and spray-paint your house or slash your tires.

[prolesunited]

52. LOL!

At least people are more sympathetic to killing ants than mice.

[ContraBass Black]

53. If they get into the microwave

Turning it on won't faze them.