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You can go a long way toward keeping ants out of your space by implementing a thorough kitchen clean-up routine, says Price. There are all kinds of traps and chemicals to get the job done, but natural methods can achieve the same goal without the environmental repercussions. If you’re keen to learn all about it, we’ve listed 7 such methods here, along with how to prevent ants from returning in the future.
Baby Powder
Natural and non-toxic, cinnamon not only kills ants, but its strong smell makes it shine as a repellent, too. Fortunately, there are safe ways to kill ants when they get in your house. Get rid of these foraging insects using eco-friendly home remedies made from things you’ll find in your pantry or at the supermarket. Carpenter ants (Camponotus spp.), may burrow through structural wood in the home and cause serious damage. These relatively large ants (up to 5/8 inch) are reddish-orange to black and have wings.
Use natural deterrents
According to Nalyanya, the most common ants that will enter your home include carpenter ants, odorous house ants, and pavement ants. You may also see big headed ants, and on the western side of the country, something called crazy ants. It's understandable that you'd want to get rid of ants fast, and the internet is in no short supply of all-natural ant control methods. While there isn't a quick, steadfast way to get rid of ants, natural ant-repellent methods are very effective.
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With a penchant for particularly sticky and sugary foods (though they’re not overly fussy), they often venture indoors to find the sweet stuff. Prevent these critters from entering your house by keeping windows and doors closed when you see them. Before you set off bug bombs or spray pesticides with wild abandon, there are less assertive methods to control ants without subjecting everyone in your home to chemicals.
Grandmother shares a cheap and easy hack for keeping pesky ants out of your house: 'I definitely needed [this]' - Yahoo Life
Grandmother shares a cheap and easy hack for keeping pesky ants out of your house: 'I definitely needed '.
Posted: Sun, 15 Oct 2023 07:00:00 GMT [source]
Insecticides may harm other insects
The species commonly seen inside the home are pavement ants, odorous house ants, or pharaoh ants (also known as sugar ants). These species feed heavily on sugars and greases commonly found in kitchens. They can be dark brown, black, or light yellowish-brown in color, and while very annoying they do not pose serious risk. If you use a general-purpose pesticide to kill ants, be aware that these chemicals can kill helpful insects, such as honeybees and predatory insects, as well as unwanted ants. Use a selective pesticide that targets only ants wherever possible.
Mix a 50/50 solution of water and distilled white vinegar to wipe away the trails the ants have been following. Vacuum away ants that you see indoors and empty the canister outside. As long as you're diligent about keeping a clean house and making sure there's no food lying around, your ant problem will disappear as quickly as it came!
Cinnamon, and generally anything with a really strong scent, like vinegar or certain essential oils, deters ants by intercepting their pheromone trails, which they use to find food. "The primary ingredient in cinnamon that might agitate ants is cinnamaldehyde," says Ismael Girard, CEO of Pest Agent. No matter how hard we try, sometimes we can't avoid pesky ants making their way into our homes. They tend to be drawn to rooms like the kitchen, where it's easy for them to find food sources to bring back to the rest of their colony. If you've recently been swarmed by ants, you might have heard that cinnamon is a good deterrent, possibly even killing them.
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It all starts with deterring them, says David Price, technical director for Mosquito Joe, a nationwide pest control company. Before “ant season” (spring and summer for most folks) even kicks in, you can make some serious headway in getting rid of them by prioritizing two things—good housekeeping and regular home maintenance. By morning, they’ve taken over every corner of your kitchen (plus, your pets are annoyed because the ants are feasting on their dog or cat food). You wind up spending the next several weeks or months trying to get rid of them, to no avail. To make matters worse, the cycle repeats itself, over and over again, each year—which leaves you wondering whether it is even possible to get rid of ants. Peppermint as well as lavender are known to repel them so you could use a diffuser to make your home less appealing or simply combine one with water and spritz it on high traffic surfaces.
Other tips to prevent ants
The baits should be placed close to visible ant trails but outside the reach of pets and children. Avoid the temptation to simply use ant-killing pesticides to spray visible ants marching along trails inside your home. Pesticide sprays can eliminate a few visible ants, but more will quickly replace them, and you'll never make real progress to eliminating the infestation.
Although they don’t eat wood, they tunnel through it to create hollow areas for their nests. If they get indoors, they’ll begin at spots with moisture damage, but from there, they can get into stronger wood, eventually weakening it and causing severe structural damage. If all else fails and the problem is severe, to effectively kill ants, Dr. Tracey Ellis, an entomologist with FarmSense, says to try using ant baits to pinpoint the entire established ant nest or colony. "Deploy ant baits, not sprays, that advertise 'queen elimination,'" she says. "Contact sprays only eliminate the ants you have sprayed, which is a very small portion of the colony."
Frequent appearances of these pests in your home may indicate a leak, high humidity, or poor drainage. Also, indoor pill bug infestations can attract other bugs, like centipedes, and damage indoor plants. Here is what you need to know about pill bugs and how to get rid of them. Teams of 'scout' ants leave pheromones to alert other ants to the source of food.
You may even need to follow them outside if they’ve nested in tree stumps or dead trees. The good news is that you probably have the best natural ant repellants on hand. Strongly scented sprays made with vinegar and essential oils like citrus are great at creating a border or line that ants won't cross. Unfortunately, there's no natural solution to keep the ants away permanently, but with regular maintenance and upkeep you can keep them away for a long time. While pill bugs are generally harmless to humans and pets, they are a nuisance indoors.
Ants occasionally come inside in search of water, particularly during dry periods. In this case you may see them in bathrooms or other humid parts of the house. Ants are one of Earth’s most successful animals, and comprise more than 13,000 species. They live almost everywhere except Antarctica, the high Arctic and a small number of islands. And no, it doesn’t usually require the use of harsh chemicals or a sizable financial investment. ©2024 Hearst UK is the trading name of the National Magazine Company Ltd, 30 Panton Street, Leicester Square, London, SW1Y 4AJ.
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