Ants

Ok, so we've made a couple of raised flower beds, flagged the yard and now all of a sudden we have tons and tons of Ants.

i thought that they were only attracted to sweet things?

I just don't understand why all of a sudden, they have decided to take residence in our garden. It must be something to do with the beds...? anyone??

 

"Summertime - and the livin's easy! ..."

Yep, it's that time of year and having provided nice well drained soil to forage about in your raised beds and loads of dry sand and rubble to burrow through under your slabs you have created a des-res for the local ant community.

Ants do like sweet things and one of the sweet things they like is honeydew produced by aphids. If you see an ant carying an aphid it's not going to eat it, it's moving it to a place where it will reproduce better and make even more sticky goo. Ants farm the blessed things and will defend them from predators!

Various proprietry chemical treatments for ants but they are all more or less toxic to other garden critters, including bees so use with caution and only if really desperate

 

That's right and remember that ants do very little harm and provide food for birds. So if you want to attract birds leave the ants alone.

 

I just wish someone would tell the birds to come and feed on the ants that are turning my lawn into a spoil heap :rolleyes:

 

Yeap, same here Paladin, after such a dry year I suppose just about everybody has ant problems now? :(

 

Surely regular mowing flattens emerging ant heaps. While waiting in the queue at local DIY store, heard checkout girl tell customer ahead that they had run out of Nippon. I said nothing but just wondered what on earth we are doing. If it crawls - kill it! Sad very sad.

 

Hornbeam: Sometime ago I had a bad attack of ants in my greenhouse (in the sandbeds when the propagator was on) and you are making me feel guilty now, for using ant powder! I imagine that I would have been over-run with them before now had I not taken this action.

I don't suppose they would do the plants much harm (not sure) but everything you touch transfers the ants up your arms! :D

Please enlighten me as to what you would have done in the circumstances?

 

Ants go for sweet stuff. Put some jam or sugar in a dish somewhere nearby where you don't mind ants. The sandbeds were a nice home so I would give it a good raking and break up the colonies.

Hate to make you feel guilty! Thing is that insects have so many generations to our one and they adapt to insecticides very quickly and build up a resistance (bit like MRSA). So the chemists keep having to invent new and stronger ones. You may have read today of the mites (that we introduced) that are devastating British bee hives. The chemicals that were developed 14 years ago to kill the mites are no longer effective because they have become immune to it. I'm not really sqeamish about killing things and am no closet Buddhist. My concern is twofold: Poisons don't work in the long term and kill indiscriminately in the short term.

 

Thanks Hornbeam, interesting thought, might give that a try next time.

Makes me wonder what you do about white/blackfly?

 

Do about white fly, black fly and greenfly?

Nothing at all, but then I'm not really a greenhouse gardener. In the open garden, I let the ladybirds and their ugly but effective grey larva chew them up. Blue tits are champion greenfly gourmets too.

 

If you have kids you can encorage them to do a bit of ant spotting.

Just drop a few spots of honey on or near an ant run; the message will be quickly passed around and the ants will form up and greedily slurp the honey like piglets round a hog then go back to the nest once they are gorged.

 

Yes and that's exactly how Nippon works. It is sweet and the scouts take it back to the nest for the young'uns. Soon there is a regular column of ants taking it back and the whole colony dies. If you must use poisons, this is the best way. Unlike ant powder which will kill anything, this is ant specific (unless a passing bee takes some too)

 

Thanks Hornbeam, I am now a convert!

Don't think I will manage to convert Mrs DAG though! :D :D :D

 

Hornbeam, you talk a lot of sense.... I'm one of those boring organic gardeners and never use chemicals.... In the 16 years I've lived here I've seen millions upon millions of ants take up residence in my garden and they have never done the slightest damage to anything, they are just nuisance value and will only emerge on occasions, most on the time they are too busy going about there daily business just as we are. They have now moved into my compost heap but do I care..... no I don't.

 

Good for you! It's the only sustainable way forward. I know we organics can be a bore, but I am only organic for one reason - it works!