"Frank" wrote:

You forgot to mention that the ants are crawling
across your scanner (they are on mine). Last year
I used a shop vacuum to suck them all up. I sat
for hours near where they were coming into my
home and probably sucked up a thousand ants.
They didn't come back for a couple months after
that. (snip)


If you want to get rid of them permanently, try the following tactic. Get
a can of Lysol disinfectant spray (the smelly normal scent) and then find
their nest.

Use a thin metal rod to stir up the nest. Probe around underground to also
disturb the nest there. Now wait until the warrior arts are swarming over
the surface of the nest (give this time - you want most of the warrior ants
on the surface).

Once there are plenty of warrior ants on the surface, spray them liberally
with the Lysol spray. Don't forget to spray the ground all around the nest
to cover any warrior ants that have spread out to search for an enemy (by
the way, watch out for these because they will immediately bite if they get
on you).

Ants use scent to identify each other. Once the warrior ants are covered
with Lysol, they can no longer detect the identity scent (the Lysol spray
also stings, driving them into a war frenzy). At this point, the warrior
ants will consider all ants in the nest to be the enemy (including the queen
ants) and will proceed to kill those other ants. Without food from the food
gatherers, the warrior ants will eventually starve to death also.

I mentioned earlier about how most warrior ants must be on the surface
before spraying. This is the insure the warriors on the surface greatly
outnumber those still underground. Otherwise, those underground will kill
those you've sprayed on the surface, defeating your efforts.

If this is done right, the nest will be permanently destroyed. After the
mound washes away from rain or lawn watering, grass will start growing in
the area again.

I've used this tactic many times with great success. The only danger is
the risk of a bite from warrior ants roaming away from the nest to search
for the enemy. If you are bitten, it WILL be very uncomfortable.

By the way, it is also amazing to watch thousands of warrior ants
attacking each other in a frenzy of death. Some individual fights can last
several hours.


Dwight Stewart (W5NET)

http://www.qsl.net/w5net/