Army of Ants!

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grumpiebk

0
Jun 22, 2016
906
FL
Not sure where to put this, so apologies in advance.

We have an army of ants coming up our gunite shell walls through the space between the coping and travertine tile. What is safe to use to put this to an end while also being safe for our children, travertine, and water? We sweep them away each morning and ant piles will be back the next day. There are thousands of ants on the pool surface every morning. Ugh......

Anyone ever use this product? It seems mostly natural with all oil ingredients:

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That spray is only going to kill the ants you see. You need an ant bait to kill off the colony. I use Amdro ant bait. You put a small amount next to their mound or entry point and they take food back to the nest. They feed the queen and she dies. Colony gone.


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JoyfulNoise said:
That spray is only going to kill the ants you see. You need an ant bait to kill off the colony. I use Amdro ant bait. You put a small amount next to their mound or entry point and they take food back to the nest. They feed the queen and she dies. Colony gone.


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Safe if it blows into the pool or if our children step on it? Or should I keep the area off limits for a couple of days?


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I show it to my kids and tell them to not touch it or play with. I explain to them very clear what it is and that it can make you sick. Even the littlest one got the concept. You only need to use a very small amount (teaspoon or so) so if you can deploy it in a way that it won't blow into the pool, that would be great.

It's such a small amount that it would not matter either way if it blew into your pool. I recently fired the weed spraying company that we had for several years. The new "tech" (who looked like he just got out of Pima County lock-up) would blast weed killer all over my yard using the truck mounted sprayer as opposed to putting on the backpack and doing careful hand spraying. He killed over a dozen plants because of the severe over spray. He would spray the chemical (with blue marker dye) carelessly all over the place and my pool coping and sidewalks would have dye stains all over them. On several occasions I witnessed him use the truck spray to launch the herbicide across my pool to the other side rather than open the gate and drag the hose over there.

Why do I mention this? Because on several occasions I would witness him spraying chemicals across the pool and getting herbicide directly in the pool water. While I was flipping mad that he did that, I never once thought that the pool was unswimmable. Chlorine is a powerful oxidizer and will destroy almost anything...and glyphosate has a short half life in water ;)


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I spray the perimeter of the pool and deck with Home Defense a few times a year and I switched all mulch in the area to cedar. This has kept the ants away from the pool for quite a few years now.
 
I have used Terro with great success looks like the Amdro is basically the same thing I would go that route. I would try the traps first as they are less hassle but if the ants don't go after that you could get the liquid and a syringe and apply it directly into the cracks. The down side to the liquid is once it drys the they aren't as interested in it, because of that I usually have to apply it twice a day for a few days, occasionally I will see a few scouts a week or two later and will do a couple more days but I have never had a third occurrence in the same location a season.

The only time I use spray is if I know exactly where the hill is and can get to it I have some commercial grade stuff I got off the web called Suspend SC I spray around the hill a couple ft diameter and they starve since any that leave die and don't bring food back.
 
You can also do this - totally non-toxic and pool safe - mix a 1:1 batch of boric acid and sugar. Add enough water to turn it into a thick paste or liquid. Apply a small amount of the liquid near the ant hill or trail nearest the hole.

The ants will take it back to their nest, feed on it and die. Boric acid is a systemic toxin to the ants. Sugar is the bait. Boric acid, in small quantities, has no effect on humans.


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You can make homemade safe ant killer by mixing borax and corn syrup. I did this last year. Many of the ant traps are exactly that. So pretty safe. Plenty of recipes online and that is what I did last year - mixed up and made my own traps by spreading some of mixture on a piece of cardboard and then folding over and taping along one edge, and placing along routes that they walk. This helped some, but not totally.

So what seemed to work best for me was getting a large pot of boiling water and pouring along the route they were walking and going back as far as I could trace them. They follow each others scent, so that helps wash it away, is non-toxic, and if you find their hill, settles it.
 
I made some of the homemade ant bait this winter after we were overrun with Argentine ants here in California. So far it has worked very well on controlling the ants coming into the house. I have yet to do any baiting outside as we have had flooding rains for the past few months...

I mixed closer to a 1:1:3 solution of 1 part borax (mule team borax), 1 part water, 3 parts sugar, and then added a splash of corn syrup to the end. I boiled this mix and then after it cooled I placed it in some beer caps and put in near an ant trail. Within 30 minutes the cap was covered completely with ants...48hrs later there was just a few ants roaming around. I read that a slightly lower borax amount takes a bit longer to kill the ants, which makes it a more effective nest killer. Argentine ants are hard to control as they can have multiple queens, share nests etc...

I used this website for inspiration: Step-by-Step Instructions - Borax Ant Killer

I had a photo of the huge ant pile that completely covered the bottle cap - my wife made me delete it because I was showing it to friends and it kept getting her mad at me!!! :hammer:
 

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I have 2 go to insecticides when it comes to bugs. Permetherin and Bifen XTS. Permetherin is supposedly safe on humans, where people use it on clothes, shampoo hair for lice, ticks, scabees, etc. I use it in the garden on fruit, vegetables, etc. It's also used in mosquito misting systems (I just bought one last week). Bifen xts is probably more lethal. I use it on the perimeter of my house and it kills just about everything. If you mix it in a gallon jug and pour over ant mounds, it will kill them immediately, including the queen versus waiting a few days with andro, boric acid, etc. Here in Houston we get huge roaches that fly great distances. This stuff kills them dead. It affects their nervous system somehow and stops them from reproducing as well. It's deadly around fish so you don't want it getting in your ponds. Both chemicals work well on Mosquito's but you have to spray every few days which is a pain. Which is why I bought a misting system that will spray a fine mist of permetherin 3 times a day. A friend had one installed 3 years ago and he has zero bugs. I hate mosquito's and can't wait to get rid of them permanently.
 
mac4lyfe said:
I have 2 go to insecticides when it comes to bugs. Permetherin and Bifen XTS. Permetherin is supposedly safe on humans, where people use it on clothes, shampoo hair for lice, ticks, scabees, etc. I use it in the garden on fruit, vegetables, etc. It's also used in mosquito misting systems (I just bought one last week). Bifen xts is probably more lethal. I use it on the perimeter of my house and it kills just about everything. If you mix it in a gallon jug and pour over ant mounds, it will kill them immediately, including the queen versus waiting a few days with andro, boric acid, etc. Here in Houston we get huge roaches that fly great distances. This stuff kills them dead. It affects their nervous system somehow and stops them from reproducing as well. It's deadly around fish so you don't want it getting in your ponds. Both chemicals work well on Mosquito's but you have to spray every few days which is a pain. Which is why I bought a misting system that will spray a fine mist of permetherin 3 times a day. A friend had one installed 3 years ago and he has zero bugs. I hate mosquito's and can't wait to get rid of them permanently.
Click to expand...


Realize this is an old post, but wondering which misting system you bought and if you’re happy with it.
 
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