Ants will usually come indoors because they are looking for water, food or a place to nest. Sometimes it may feel as though thousands of tiny ants have invaded your home. Even small crumbs of food can attract hordes of ants. If you see them in areas like the bathroom during a drought, they are probably searching for water. They may also be seen crawling around leaky plumbing fixtures. Heavy rains can also cause their nests to flood and force them to look for shelter in your home.
In the summer months, the two types of ants most likely to show up are carpenter ants and house ants. When ants like carpenter ants are not dealt with, they can cause structural damage because they carve nests into wooden structures. Aside from carpenter ants causing property damage, house ants contaminate food and although they don’t transmit disease, they can be a real nuisance.
Prevent ants from coming in
Your first step in dealing with an ant problem is to try and prevent them from getting into your home in the first place. Seal up any cracks and holes in the walls. This will also prevent them from nesting in the wall cavities. You can also remove tree branches from near the home and reduce the amount of mulch on the sides of the house to reduce the likelihood of infestations.
Ants mostly live in protected spaces, either underground or within walls. Whatever methods you use to try and kill them, you may kill some of the worker ants but you won’t deal with the whole colony. You may need to call in professional pest control services with experience in handling ant invasions. Kansas City pest control company, Advantage, will get rid of your ants while minimizing pesticide use and maximizing safety.
Don’t give them access to food
You need to make sure ants don’t have access to food or they will always seem to find a way in. Seal food in airtight containers, deal with crumbs in the toaster and don’t leave pet food out for longer than you need to. Clean up any sugary spills right away, particularly things like honey or soda.
Make sure any bins are tightly sealed or you will quickly see a line of ants marching along in search of the food inside. When you see a line of ants, you can try wiping down the surface with bleach or vinegar as this will disrupt the chemical trail. Only one ant needs to find food and it starts laying a trail for others. Ants leave tiny droplets of pheromones for other ants to follow.
Using ant poison can make you feel like you’re dealing with the problem but unless you solve the problem of what’s attracting them to your home and how they’re getting in, you are likely to just keep seeing them because there are thousands of ants in each colony. Insect barrier sprays are usually ineffective and worse, they often contain harmful chemicals.
Get to the source
In most ant colonies, the queen ant produces the workers. If you want to destroy the colony, you will need to kill the queen. Finding out where an infestation originated will help to simplify the treatment process. When you follow the trail of ants, it will lead you to the source of the infestation.
Exterminators will find the colony and then target it using effective formulas. The goal is to destroy the nest and stop any ants from returning. They usually incorporate preventative measures into their control practices to stop future infestations from happening.
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