What is the best way to treat ant hills on your property?
If you notice even a tiny group of ants, there are likely more of them on your property. Ants may not seem bothersome to you. After all, how much damage can an ant colony actually cause? Well… a lot, actually. Ant infestations are notorious for causing painful bites and stings and even drive homeowners to leave their properties until the infestation is treated by professionals. Of course, you don’t want that to happen, right?
If you see ant hills scattered around your property, you need to devise a plan to get rid of them immediately. The more you allow them to build and spread, the more they will expand to other areas around your property.
When you browse the internet, there are long lists of the best treatment for ant hills. However, if you are not comfortable treating your property yourself, you can hire a pest control company to do it for you.
Why should you take immediate action on getting rid of ant hills?
The National Wildlife Federation says that the vast majority of more than 12,000 species of ants are not harmful to humans. However, although their biological composition will not threaten you, what they can transmit does. For example, they can carry bacteria that may cause allergies, or trigger other health concerns. These include some of the most painful bites and stings in the insect kingdom!
In short, if you or any of your family members have health issues, it’s always better to terminate all sources of potentially health-compromising elements.
Here are a few tips for getting rid of ant hills on your property:
Best Treatment for Ant Hills
Now that you have been made aware of these threats, here are the best treatments you can use to remove ant hills from your property.
Some suggest using strong chemicals to get rid of ant hills. It might be a practical solution, but there are other safer options. You don’t need to resort to extensive chemicals use that may threaten your health and the health of plants and pets.
As such, here are some natural ways to remove and repel ant hills:
Diatomaceous Earth
DE is a silicon dioxide made from the fossilized residue of marine planktons called diatoms.
DEs are neither chemicals nor poisons. They kill ants by draining the oils of their skeletons until all the oils are absorbed.
Nevertheless, if you purchase a food-grade product for DEs, wear gloves and masks. They are not harmful to you but getting exposed to them might cause some irritation on the skin. It’s always better to avoid contact with it.
Using DEs is simple. You only need to sprinkle it:
· On or around the ant colony
· Plants or on your whole vegetable garden
· Doorways or windows
· Furniture and fixtures
· Garbage cans or bags
· Ant nests and ant trails
Garbage cans or bags are clever ant baits since they love leftovers. As such, applying DEs will immediately eliminate the ants that wander to the garbage looking for an easy leftover meal.
Hot Water with Glass Cleaner and Liquid Detergent
A mixture of hot water with household cleaning agents guarantees eradication of ants, at least to those ants in the mound’s vicinity.
To ensure they won’t create another ant mound, use a glass cleaner and liquid detergent to deter the ants from reentering the ant hills they’ve already built on your property.
Ant trails are littered with scented pheromones used by ants as their map. If you successfully remove these biochemical scents, they’ll get lost. Hence, deterring the ants’ entry into your home.
Here is a quick guide to creating your master “ant hill removal” plan:
1. Blend glass cleaning spray with liquid detergent into a clean drizzle bottle.
2. Strew the remedy on sites where ants appear to penetrate from or assemble around.
3. After spraying, brush down the area leaving light remnants.
4. Duplicate the above actions as frequently as needed.
Note: If you do not have any glass cleaner available, using cleaning agents of any kind, i.e., liquid dish detergent, can terminate the smell of ant pheromones.
Kill the Queen
Killing the worker ants you see will not solve your ant problem. However, killing the queen will.
The queen ant is the one laying eggs. The more eggs she lays, the more worker ants will be born to fill the void of those you killed with hot water or DEs.
IF you’re able to find and kill the queen, you’ll effectively cut off the reproduction cycle of the ant colony. Eventually the workers will die out and will not be replaced with a new generation of workers. The colony will die out and your ant problem will be over!
Different ant species have other ways to hide their queen ant. It’s usually pretty difficult to find the queen.
Most pest control personnel are trained to resolve the infestation at the grassroots. It means that they have the equipment and planning matrix as a guide for handling rare cases where the infestation is hard to control.
Contact ProHealth Pest Control to Solve your Ant Hill Problem
All the treatments mentioned above are considered best treatment for ant hills, but they are only band-aid solutions that you can try to contain the problem. However, once you startle these little pests, they will not stop trying to rebuild their ant colony. The best treatment for any hills and colonies is contacting the professionals at ProHealth Pest Control for assistance.
There are many ways to get methodically rid of ants. However, if you feel like the job of removing ant infestation on your house is for a professional, call ProHealth Pest Control at 727-310-0521 or 813-773-0850 to save your day with a free consultation for ant control services.