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08/11/07, 09:40 AM
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Join Date: May 2002
Posts: 15,516
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Large ant hills.
We have a few on our land and I'm wondering what is the easiest way to rid ourselves of them?
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08/11/07, 09:46 AM
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Join Date: May 2004
Location: Hill Country, Texas
Posts: 4,649
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Have one of us in the southern US send you a bag of fire ant bait. Hopefully you don't have fire ants, but the fire ant bait will kill the colony.
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08/11/07, 09:53 AM
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Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: NW GA
Posts: 227
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If you can't get fire ant bait, you can use DE. You can put some sugar in it to bait them and make sure you complete encircle the mound.
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08/11/07, 10:12 AM
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Earth
Posts: 1,869
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mix 1 part sugar with 5 parts boric acid if you want to stay organic and kill 'em dead...
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08/11/07, 11:08 AM
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Join Date: Feb 2004
Location: Texas
Posts: 1,176
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Or you can look for a product called Spinocid (organic). Sprinkle a bit on your hills and they will be gone.
If you don't care about staying organic, you can sprinkle some Over N'Out on the hills.
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08/11/07, 12:02 PM
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Up the Creek
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Join Date: Jan 2007
Location: Ash, NC
Posts: 201
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Sprinkle Instant Grits on each mound. The ants eat the grits, get thirsty, the grits swell up, POP! Bye bye ant.
Doug
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I Rule My World!...Tonya said I could.
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08/11/07, 12:12 PM
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Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: No. Illinois
Posts: 1,447
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Whatever you use, make sure it says on the label that the bait will be taken back to the queen. Kill the queen, kill the colony. It takes a month or so, but it works. I use Combat.
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"They laughed, because he was different"
"He laughed, because they were all the same"
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08/11/07, 12:39 PM
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Join Date: Apr 2004
Location: North Carolina
Posts: 587
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We had a fire ant problem in our bee yard but since a) our bees live there and b) my kids spend a lot of time out there my youngest ds started doing a lot of reading about how to get rid of them cheaply and without chemicals. He read on the dirt doctor website about using cornmeal to get rid of them and had also read the boric acid treatment info, during all of that reading he had read somewhere about trying to persuade the queen into nesting in an upside down jar. Long story short, he ended up mixing up boric acid, cornmeal and cornsyrup into a play dough like consistency.... he put that in old jelly jars, baby food jars etc and turned the jars upside down on the edge of the ant hills. Works like a charm, not an ant left!
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08/11/07, 12:46 PM
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Join Date: Sep 2004
Location: Canada
Posts: 7,426
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Ardie/WI
We have a few on our land and I'm wondering what is the easiest way to rid ourselves of them?
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you have fire ants in wisconsin? 
or do you mean just the big common anthills seen in practically in all fields or pastures? Some here are easily 5 ft. diameter and some 2 ft. tall. I tried boric acid on one near the garden. The ants still returned. 
__________________
The human spirit needs places where nature has not been rearranged by the hand of man.
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08/11/07, 01:35 PM
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Join Date: May 2002
Posts: 15,516
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by moonwolf
you have fire ants in wisconsin?
or do you mean just the big common anthills seen in practically in all fields or pastures? Some here are easily 5 ft. diameter and some 2 ft. tall. I tried boric acid on one near the garden. The ants still returned. |
No fire ants that I know of. These are just plain ordinary ants.
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08/11/07, 05:45 PM
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Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: Northern IL centrally located
Posts: 289
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Referring back to a recent post of mine:
I am so excited -in a good way--
This info came from the person who gave me my worm compost.
So my suggestion is to try sprinkling Splenda around and see what happens.
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08/12/07, 09:20 AM
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Banned
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Join Date: Nov 2006
Location: Northern Wisconsin
Posts: 1,184
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We have HUGE ant mounds up here, same as MW easy 5 feet across and sometimes they are close to 3 feet high. When I had one in the yard of a place I moved into I just went out and dug the whole thing up, the ants got mad and moved I guess cause they didn't re-build the mound.
Margie
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08/12/07, 11:49 AM
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Join Date: Sep 2004
Location: Canada
Posts: 7,426
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by NWoods_Hippie
We have HUGE ant mounds up here, same as MW easy 5 feet across and sometimes they are close to 3 feet high. When I had one in the yard of a place I moved into I just went out and dug the whole thing up, the ants got mad and moved I guess cause they didn't re-build the mound.
Margie
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I've also been told that if you take a shovelfull of ants and dirt from one hilll, and put that on another anthill, the ants will fight and destroy the mound. I tried this once. To tell the truth, I never went back in that part of the field to see the end results. lol
Also, northern flickers love ants as a major portion of their diet. I try and mow very clear areas around the ant mounds to make them appear very prevelant and easier prey for any flickers in the area. Flicker nest boxes help to keep around.
__________________
The human spirit needs places where nature has not been rearranged by the hand of man.
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08/12/07, 12:02 PM
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Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: The Woods of Georgia
Posts: 950
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grits dont work sorry old wives tale. Being from the state of Georgia home to Fireant College where we have Professors and students who do nothing but study fire ants I should know.
The University of georgia has specialty classes just on fireants LOL 
Sugar isnt a good idea either unless you want to raise and breed ants LOL
Gosh people are you crazy?
The truth is its hard to get rid of ants.
There are ant baits that are available on the market that work well.
Amdro comes to mind.
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08/12/07, 12:04 PM
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In Remembrance
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Join Date: May 2002
Posts: 6,844
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I'm not organic. A gallon of diesel oil poured in the middle of the mound does wonder.
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08/12/07, 12:38 PM
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Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: Northern IL centrally located
Posts: 289
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by pixelphotograph
grits dont work sorry old wives tale. Being from the state of Georgia home to Fireant College where we have Professors and students who do nothing but study fire ants I should know.
The University of georgia has specialty classes just on fireants LOL
Sugar isnt a good idea either unless you want to raise and breed ants LOL
Gosh people are you crazy?
The truth is its hard to get rid of ants.
There are ant baits that are available on the market that work well.
Amdro comes to mind. |
Wasn't talking about sugar---Splenda.
Mary Chris the person who gave me my worms and compost wrote this and said I was free to share this info:
"Oh, and Splenda will kill them(the ants). We sprinkled a small amount in a circle around their in-ground home when we noticed some large ants. It kills ants and in less than a week there were no critters anywhere, and only a few listless worms alive. I can only wonder what it does to humans!
Btw, I learned about using Splenda to kill ants from a Yahoo money-saving group member. I never expected it to work. Pretty scary, isn't it?! "
I haven't tried this yet as I don't have any splenda at the moment. Hence, I suggested that you could try it and see if it works for you.
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08/12/07, 03:11 PM
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Join Date: May 2005
Posts: 2,274
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We're lucky we don't have fire ants - you wouldn't have them either in Wisconsin.
We had these particular ants on the farm too - they were a type of field ant. When we were kids we stomped on the mounds and then they disappeared like magic (apparently these ants didn't like kids stomping on those big hills - but ohhhh, what fun watching ticked off ants)
I don't see messing with them if they aren't hurting anything. If one is in a spot where it REALLY bothers you for some reason, just drench that one mound with a liquid insecticide labeled for ants.
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08/13/07, 10:39 AM
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Join Date: May 2002
Location: missoula, montana
Posts: 1,407
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Ardie,
Do you have chickens? Ants make great chicken feed.
Are these ants causing some trouble? If they are a ways away and they aren't hurting anything, the easiest thing is to ignore them.
If you really wanna do something about it, I would like to ask that you stick to something organic. Like DE.
Plus, I wanna say that boric acid (borates, borate powders, borax, etc.) is not (are not) organic.
I wrote a ditty on flea control a month back or so. I covered DE and borates pretty thoroughly. I hope it is of use to you.
Last edited by Paul Wheaton; 08/19/07 at 04:21 PM.
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08/13/07, 11:38 AM
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Earth
Posts: 1,869
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Paul -Then why is it listed on the N.O.P. list as being allowed for use as an insecticide?
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08/13/07, 01:25 PM
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Join Date: May 2002
Location: missoula, montana
Posts: 1,407
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Bill,
Do you have a link for that?
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