Crazy ants - anybody got tips for dealing with them?

[AmosMoses01]

Here in Central Texas we've got a smorgasbord of insects, but I'm having the dangdest time dealing with crazy ants. They don't seem to have rhyme or reason to them, but they do appear to like both my new JT as well as the Mrs' JLU, finding them inside, outside, every which side. We don't have or keep any food items at all in our vehicles, so it isn't food that is drawing them. We don't have a garage to put them in, so the Jeeps both have to live outside, and our driveway is under oak branches, so we have that going against us.

In the past I had these dang things make a nest inside the top's drain tube of my Miata, which was an epic pain in the rear to clean out. In that car's very tiny cabin, I sprayed a bunch of peppermint oil where I found them nesting, after reading they don't like the stuff. That proved effective - but I don't know where I'd put it in the much bigger Jeeps, especially since I haven't found a nest. Spraying inseciticide inside the vehicle doesn't seem like a good idea.

I may just have to start spraying the perimiter of all the tires with Talstar Pro (pretty potent insecticide, appropriately diluted of course) on a consistent basis, but maybe y'all have some pointers or other ideas that could help out. Thanks in advance for any ideas or suggestions.

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[DocMike]

Try vinegar. Perimeter of the vehicle.
Not sure what it would do to the tires.
I have used to to keep ants away in Colorado.

Here in Central Texas we've got a smorgasbord of insects, but I'm having the dangdest time dealing with crazy ants. They don't seem to have rhyme or reason to them, but they do appear to like both my new JT as well as the Mrs' JLU, finding them inside, outside, every which side. We don't have or keep any food items at all in our vehicles, so it isn't food that is drawing them. We don't have a garage to put them in, so the Jeeps both have to live outside, and our driveway is under oak branches, so we have that going against us.

In the past I had these dang things make a nest inside the top's drain tube of my Miata, which was an epic pain in the rear to clean out. In that car's very tiny cabin, I sprayed a bunch of peppermint oil where I found them nesting, after reading they don't like the stuff. That proved effective - but I don't know where I'd put it in the much bigger Jeeps, especially since I haven't found a nest. Spraying inseciticide inside the vehicle doesn't seem like a good idea.

I may just have to start spraying the perimiter of all the tires with Talstar Pro (pretty potent insecticide, appropriately diluted of course) on a consistent basis, but maybe y'all have some pointers or other ideas that could help out. Thanks in advance for any ideas or suggestions.

 

[spectre6000]

Like many of the problems associated with living in Texas, the best and most permanent solution is to GTFO.

-Former Texan

 

[Sazabi19]

Bug spray on the suspension parts if you dont' want to put it on the wheels, but those should be their vector unless they're dropping in from the ceiling... You could also have a small mound of the dry stuff you park all 4 wheels on for each vehicle.

 

[Undecided]

The liquid ant bait from Terro works GREAT here in the Midwest.

maybe place one near a tire and let it be for a day or two.

They drink it up and take it back to the nest and share. At first it will pull them out to the extreme to collect it but then they’ll be gone in a day or two.

This can also let you follow the trail and find the nest. If it’s too big for one you know where to place the second.

That would at least wipe out the nests near you and give relief till another showed up.

 

[spectre6000]

For all the general ant suggestions, crazy ants are a different thing. Invasive species. We don't have anything like this in Colorado. I grew up with fire ants, and they were bad. The ants up here don't even count as ants in my mind. Fewer of them at a time, and they don't bite like crazy. Crazy ants are supposed to be worse than fire ants, but they were only just starting to show up in the news more northerly counties (where I'm from) about the time we left. Getting warmer I suppose.

(Crazy ants) are not attracted to ordinary ant baits, and are not controlled by over-the-counter pesticides, and are harder to fully exterminate than many other species because their colonies have multiple queens. In June 2008, the United States Environmental Protection Agency granted temporary approval for the use of fipronil, an antitermite agent, to control this ant. Its use is currently restricted to infested counties.

Maybe consider this before resorting to baits and poisons as have been suggested since they apparently won't do anything.

 

[Undecided]

For all the general ant suggestions, crazy ants are a different thing. Invasive species. We don't have anything like this in Colorado. I grew up with fire ants, and they were bad. The ants up here don't even count as ants in my mind. Fewer of them at a time, and they don't bite like crazy. Crazy ants are supposed to be worse than fire ants, but they were only just starting to show up in the news more northerly counties (where I'm from) about the time we left. Getting warmer I suppose.



Maybe consider this before resorting to baits and poisons as have been suggested since they apparently won't do anything.

huh. Had no idea that was a name.
Honestly thought poster was calling them crazy as in just being annoying or something.

these really suck then. Sorry OP no idea how to help with this

 

[bleda2002]

Does amdro work on crazy ants? Amdro seems to kill Florida ant mounds really quick as they take it back to the nest and the queen eats it. Maybe sprinkle it all over the driveway and around the tires and see if you can track where the mound is by where they take it.

 

[Rocksalt]

boric acid ant and roach powder

 

[rharr]

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Safer-B...ea-Ant-Crawling-Insect-Killer-51703/206857782

Diatomaceous Earth

make a ring of this around the cars. It is basically tiny razors to bugs and will cut them and dry them out.

 

[ShadowsPapa]

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Safer-B...ea-Ant-Crawling-Insect-Killer-51703/206857782

Diatomaceous Earth

make a ring of this around the cars. It is basically tiny razors to bugs and will cut them and dry them out.

And it won't hurt the neighbor's dog, etc.

Around here I have to set up moats around all of the bird feeder hangers.
The ants in the house are driving my wife crazy. We've never seen them so bad, little tiny ones, too. But then it's been so dry, drought - normally the wet season drowns them and reduces their numbers. This year no rain to flood their homes and drown them.
I've tried all of the sprays and such - no luck.
A few years ago we had carpenter ants - not the type of carpenters that build things, they eat and destroy things. Got those gone, now it's tiny annoying ants in everything and even digging up a new walkway.

 

[brianinca]

I was going to say, boric acid is the best medicine. RELATIVELY low toxicity, and heck it makes a good bath for itchy dogs, too.

boric acid ant and roach powder

 

[AmosMoses01]

Thanks for the replies and idea's yall - I'd forgotten about Diatomaceous Earth, we'd used it years ago to "proactively" treat a bunch of (unwashed) clothing that my daughter brought back after a missions trip to Africa, in case she accidentally imported a critter. We've got a bag of it somewhere, will put it out around the Jeeps, but the Central Texas breezes will conspire to whisk it away fairly quickly. Will see about getting the boric acid stuff too. (Heck, thinking about it, I could probabaly safely put the diatomaceous earth inside of the Jeeps...)

I realized after writing my post that perhaps not everyone is familiar with crazy ants. Crazy ants are pretty strange. They move really fast, and like to get into electical junction boxes, fuse panels, etc. and have been known to short out the circuits inside. When they get the hankering to be someplace, they're everywhere. They're small, but not as small as the little sugar ants, and don't seem to be attracted to the sugar water, or other foods or baits. I've not found a crazy ant mound to put Andro or Orthene on, other than the one nest when they decided my Miata was a nice place to make one. And, so far, I've never been bitten by a crazy ant. They're said to be enemies of fire ants, which seems plausible. We've got both - though I guess it seems like we have less fire ants than years before.

Invasive species are no fun. I grew up in southern Louisiana and the Mississippi Gulf Coast, and remember when fire ants blew threw on their invasion. Before the fire ants came, we just had regular old black ants. I can remember when we had mounts of both types in the yard - you could take a shovel of a fire ant mount and dump on a black ant mount (or vice versa) and watch a major ant battle to the death. But it wasn't long before all the black ants were gone and it was just fire ants. Our house was on stilt on a bayou, so every time a hurricane blew through, we'd be in the back with long pool skimmers to shoo away the big fire ant balls - in floods, fire ants will cling to each other and protect the queen, forming a big honking ball of ants that will swarm over the first dry, solid then they bump in to. Fun times. If there's a pro to fire ants, though, it is that they are enemies of termites - so I'll give them a kudo for that.

 

[BUZZHEAD]

MALATHION I spray around the foundation come spring .
KILLS THEM ALL

 

[redfish]

Ants are drawn to electrical currents , had to replace the motherboards in my home air conditioners twice last year , they are drawn in and then fry themselves . I spray weekly and put andro around them once a month now.

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