Carol,
ANTS and more ANTS, How can I get rid of the ANTS? Red Ants and the little ones that show up in the kitchen?
Thanks!
Rex
Hobe Sound

Hello Rex,
Welcome to Florida, we do have ants. The best way to control ants in the home is to prevent their entry into the home. Most ants live in colonies and forage into our homes looking for the same things we need for life - food and water.

Here are a few things you can do to prevent ants:
-Locate and seal, caulk, or cover any openings in your home.

-Trim trees and shrubs so that branches do not contact walls or roof lines.

-Remove infested, indoor potted plants and treat.

-Repair leaky sinks and water fountains.

Once you have prevented access to you home by the ants, it is a simple matter to bait any remaining ants inside the home. Sometimes a barrier treatment is useful in preventing outdoor nesting ants from coming indoors. This is accomplished by using an insecticide, silica gel dust, or boric acid dust is applied outdoors to cracks and crevices, but only where ants enter the structure. Avoid treating all surfaces. Apply any pesticides according to the label recommendations as to rate and frequency – anything!, the label is the law.

Location of the nest is a key step in the management of ants. Once the nest, mound, colony is found, killing the queen and brood (juvenile ants), will stop the production of new ants, and the colony will die. There are many pesticides made for the control of ants. I suggest a bait treatment followed by a drench mound treatment 2 to 4 weeks after the application of the bait.

But the question is, How do you find the nest? Here are some tips:

-Follow worker ants back to nesting area, look along electrical wires, outlets, and light switches, around doors, windows, plumbing, and vents, and along cracks and crevices.

-If all else fails, put food out to attract them, then follow workers who have eaten back their nest.

Rex, one of the most comprehensive site I have found on controlling ants in Florida is produced to help school personnel dealing with ants. Integrated Pest Management (IPM) for Ants in School found at http://schoolipm.ifas.ufl.edu/tp6.htm and to help you identify the ants you have, check out Pest Ants of Florida at http://flrec.ifas.ufl.edu/entomo/ants/Pest%20Ants%20of%20FL/index.htm

Happy Hunting,
Carol