Carpenter Ants - A Springtime Pest

For homeowners in Denver, Fort Collins and elsewhere in Colorado springtime coincides with the arrival of carpenter ants. These pests may wander out from their colonies on milder winter days but are really visible in large numbers once the weather warms up. They are seasonal pests that starting swarming in the spring for reproduction purposes and continue to be a nuisance throughout the summer. Even though they are annoying pests and can cause damage to your home if left unchecked, you can get rid of carpenter ants that are infesting your home or property.

In order to eliminate carpenter ant populations in your home or on your property you must understand why they are there in the first place. A common misconception about these pests is that they eat the wood they attack. In reality these large black ants only excavate the wood in order to make tunnels, galleries and to grow their nests. The mainstays of their diet include other dead or living insects, insect honeydew as well as juices from plants. They will, however, also forage for food items around your home including grease, pet food, meats, sugar and other foodstuffs commonly found in a typical kitchen.

Carpenter ants by nature prefer rotten or decayed wood but will excavate dry wood. They thrive in moisture ridden environments so you are likely to find these ants in bathroom, kitchens and other areas where moisture is at a premium including in or around household appliances and leaking pipes. They will also reside around doors, windows and foundations; often entering through cracks or even via utility lines that connect through walls. Like many insects and rodents they are fully equipped to utilize overhanging trees and shrubs to make their way indoors.

It is important to understand that while carpenter ants may seem merely annoying they can be destructive to the woodwork in and around your home. If you notice carpenter ants in or around your home this spring, contacting a pest control company in your area that offers complete carpenter ant control and relief from these pests is the best solution. Trained pest control professionals can help you locate any colonies on your property as well as offer remedies to get rid of the pests. Do-It-Yourself ant treatments are not always effective and rarely reach the source of the infestation nor completely eliminate the entire population. Remember spring is when carpenter ant activity in Denver and all of Colorado increases but you do not have to let them become a nuisance in your home.

Visit our site to learn more about insect control and find out more about getting rid of ants.

How to Get Rid of Ants in Your Kitchen With No Poison and No Mess

I have been unable to find the nest that is producing all of the ants that come into my kitchen overnight. I have tried several things to stop them. I've tried caulking all of the little holes they were coming through, but the ants always find new, harder-to-reach cracks and holes to use to enter the kitchen. I've tried hardware store ant baits and ant traps, and the ants ignore them. I've tried home remedies I've found on the internet such as pepper, baby, powder, and diatomaceous earth. None of the home remedies seemed to affect the ants, and they made my kitchen counters and floors look and feel very dirty. I've even tried spraying poison around my windows and along counter crevices, but it made me so paranoid about literally killing myself and my family, I chickened out and wiped off as much as I could and cleaned the surfaces I had sprayed.

Still, each morning I would come downstairs to find forty or fifty ants walking around in lines on my counters. I have a family and we do a lot of cooking, and we are often too tired at night to completely wipe down the kitchen and put away all dirty dishes, and besides, the ants were able to get into my dishwasher and feed on the tiny bits of food on the plates and silverware. Then the ants got ground up during the dishwashing cycle and we were finding tiny little black specks on our dishes that turned out to be tiny ant parts. GROSS!

A few weeks ago, I stumbled upon an amazing discovery. My wife buys these fragrance sprays from White Barn Candle Company and Bath and Body Works. They come in these little metal spray canisters. They are slightly smaller than an empty toilet paper tube. I reached for the Spiced Cider Concentrated Room Spray by White Barn Candle Company, but also available at Bath and Body Works. (No, I do not work for them as an affiliate.) It occurred to me that since ants use their sense of smell to find food, this stuff might blow their little circuits since it has a strong cinnamon smell and keep the ants away. It was worth a try. I sprayed a line of the spray all along the back edges of my counter and along the top of the inside of my dishwasher where they had been coming in. The spray is completely colorless but it is definitely not odorless. The next morning, NO ANTS!

I couldn't believe it! I do have to re-spray every few days, and we open a window and run the exhaust fan over the stove because the smell is really strong when you first spray the perimeter. However, the smell subsides after a few minutes and it is so worth it not to have to wipe up forty or fifty ants with a damp sponge and wash them down the sink every morning first thing. I have confirmed that Spiced Cider Room Spray is available for consumption on the internet for about $3.00, so you don't even have to go to the mall. I do not know if other cinnamon-based sprays would work, but it might be worth a shot. I am sticking with Spiced Cider, because I know it works.

Get Rid of Tiny House Ants

Because I run a website on pests, many people ask me, "How do I get rid of tiny house ants?" Getting rid of tiny house ants isn't as difficult as you might imagine.

Odorous House Ants (Tapinoma sessile) can be brown or black. Like all insects, they have six legs and also have a segmented oval body. They are typically 1/16 to 1/8 inch long. They have antennae. They swarm in early summer.

You know you're dealing with them if, when crushed, you smell a faint coconut odor.

Odorous House Ants have extremely large colonies, in some cases having more than 100,000 members and hundreds of breeding Queens.

They like to live in shallow surfaces and can often be found in mulch, debris, and rotting logs. They also can nest indoors preferring the cold dark spaces of walls, hot water pipes, and carpets. This makes getting rid of tiny house ants a problem.

While they don't bite or sting, they are a nuisance. They can also cause some minor house damage.

To get rid of tiny house ants, first remove all potential food sources. You should wipe up spills, keep counter tops clean, and store all food (especially sweets) in sealed containers.

Then, spray the ants that are visible to you with a mixture of water and peppermint essential oil. To keep the ants away, sprinkle coffee grounds around the kitchen.

Ultimately, you'll want to attack the nest though if you want to get rid the ants once and for all.

When you find a nest, use this mixture to destroy it. Mix 5 tspb. Of cornmeal with 3 tspb of bacon grease. Add 3 tspb. of baking powder and 3 packages of yeast. Then, put it on something like a canning jar lid and place the lid near the nest. The ants will literally eat themselves to death!

Visit our site to learn more about insect control and find out more about getting rid of ants.

How to Get Rid of Ants in Your Home

There are over 12000 species of ants in the world,they build colonies just like humans and are in a constant battle for space.

Here are a few facts about Ants:

1.Ants have been living on the Earth for more than 100 million years and can be found almost anywhere on the planet.

2.Ants build many different types of homes. Many ants build simple little mounds out of dirt or sand. Other ants use small sticks mixed with dirt and sand to make a stronger mound that offers protection from rain.

3.Ants Build Cities large ant hills contain complex ventilation systems that remove carbon dioxide and bring in fresh air

4.Ants are social insects, which means they live in large colonies or groups. Some colonies consist of millions of ants. There are three types of ants in each species, the queen, the sterile female workers, and males.

5.Ants are the only animal besides humans which wage war in organized batallions, against other organized opponents.

6.Ants do not have lungs. Oxygen enters through tiny holes all over the body and Carbon Dioxide leaves through the same holes.

They are made up of 3 main parts. The head, the trunk, and the rear or metasoma. All six legs are attached to the trunk. The head consists of the jaws, eyes, and antennae.

So when they invade our property they can cause havoc,as they will use our food supply as their own.

How do we get rid of them?

I added a few methods which work in my own experience.

1.Ant powder or talcum powder/baby powder.This method is the one which in my experience works the best. Because the ant breaths through holes in its body the powder clogs the holes and eventually kills the ant,the ant also takes the powder back to its colony and affects other ants with the same process.Add powder to floors and next to walls leave for a week and it will get rid of your ant problem. Please be aware that ant powders can be poisonous so be very careful using this near young children and pets.

2. Another home remedy to kill ants is to mix boric acid and sugar together into a paste, about one tablespoon of boric acid to a cup of sugar.Drop the paste near where you saw the ants,they will eat the poisonous paste and take it back to the nest and infect the queen hence wiping out the colony.

3.Black pepper is a poison free, cheap, and safe way to get rid of ants - sprinkle the black pepper where you see them in your property and watch them run away from the pepper. Follow them to where they're exiting - which is the same spot they're entering in at - and sprinkle the pepper at that spot to keep them from coming back in. It's safe to use in your cabinets, on windowsills, near your pets and kids, around food it is also environmental friendly.