Pond Boss Forums POND CONSTRUCTION Building a dam ANTS!!

I noticed today on my pond dam about 5 HUGE ant hills. Is there any concern with ants on a pond dam with respect to the integrity of the dam? I want to get rid of them because I don't want my kids getting into them. Whats the best way to do this?

I'll bet some pellet form of insecticide would do the trick. I know in the Spring the rains force lots of the tiny black ants into homes around me, and they apply an insecticide that the ants take back to their colony as food where it eradicates them. I'm thinking that might be your best bet - I'd think the product would be available from some retail source....I'll bet someone here can help a lot more than I can.

Are these nasty Southern US stinging red ants?

I'm not sure if they're fire ants, but they do sting. I just want to get rid of them.

I use Amdro for fire ants, carpenter ants and any other kind of ants. It works but more take their place. I have learned that killing ants is easy. Eliminating them is temporary.

Mix your insecticide at the highest mixture of recommendation and place at least a cup full in the ant hill and leave them alone for about 2 days.

Ive been putting used coffe grounds on mine.I dont know if it kills em or not,but the mounds are abandoned a few days later.

Great Tom, now you have a bunch of angry ants that can't sleep.

Raid baby raid!!! Get to spraying. If you can without danger put down some lighter fluid on the mounds and light away! If they are not fire ants turn them into fire ants!!!

Baits like Amdro are slow acting so that the queen is also killed by bait brought by workers. No queen and the colony dies. Some fire ant colonies now have multiple queens, so it sometimes takes a while. The baits are pretty safe and should work, just follow label instructions. I am wondering if yours are actually fire ants. I am told that fire ants really hurt.

Fire ants DO HURT!!! I know from expierence. They are all over in Arkansas. I your not careful they will be up and in your boot in a hurry!! And you will be doing the carzy dance They are really small looking though. As a matter of fact you would not even thing they could hurt you. They look a lot like your common house ant but man can they bite you!!! At least that's the type we have here in Arkansas. I don't know if they are the same in other states?

ask yer local licensed professional if they have "termidor"

if they do, use it.

we struggled w/ ants for years and as near as i can tell, that termidor stuff is the best thing sinced canned beer but you cant buy over counter.

I ended up placing Amdro on Friday. I'll see what happens next weekend. If that doesn't work I'll break out some diesel.

Use Bifen and follow directions. I use this for termites and ants.

The best product ever for ANY ants is called Terro(powdered form) comes in an orange can. It kills the entire mound in less than an hour, the ant mound will not relocate. After 24 hours the powder is non-toxic and can be washed away.

The problem with nearly all other ant poisons is that they can take up to a week to work and by then most of the mound is moved.

Terro is a hard product to find, usually only stocked in small garden centers but you can probably find it online easily.

Having worked with the Obi Wan Kenobe of pest control (my brother), I can tell you that anything that kills ants quickly will not kill the mound (if they are the red, imported fireant and not the native black fireant). If you look carefully at each mound, there are satellite colonies surrounding it. If the main colony dies, social insects such as bees, ants and termites can create a new queen in one of the satellites. The mound can extend underground 6' or deeper and few ants are permitted to go where the queen is.

Baits are effective because when the fireants discover a new source of food, they feed it to the satellite colony first. After about a week and no ill effects, they begin to feed the whole mound and satellites with the new food (bait). Because baits are slow-acting, ants build up a fatal dose before they discover the problem. A bait can take 6 weeks to work but they are the best control known. Thank the Texas Aggies for that.

Use your bait for two years and then switch to a bait with a different active ingredient to keep them from developing a resistance. Ants can lay hundreds of eggs a day and many dozens of generations each year. It doesn't take long to develop immunity at that prolific of reproduction rates.

Plan on putting out bait 3 times per year. Early spring, early summer and early fall. READ THE INSTRUCTIONS ON THE BAG and broadcast spread the bait over a large area and not just near the mound. Fireants will actively forage for the bait and will pick it up quite some distance from the mound, but if you dump it on the mound, that seems somewhat suspicious. Baits aren't like contact poisons or stomach poisons.

The best time to put out bait is when ants are actively foraging so a day after a rain when the ground is dry but the ants are rebuilding their supplies is good. Put out the bait early to mid morning after the dew is off the grass so they have all day to pick it up. Ants don't forage at night.

Good luck!

I endorse the terro, and kjm has some solid advice. Bait is about the best, but with ants, you only get rid of them temporarily, unless you destroy all of them within a global radius. The problem with ants besides having very few natural predators and being underground is they multiply and remultiply. I have never eradicated them. Just set back local colonies. And it is a matter of time before distant colonies recolonize the empty territory. It's always an upanthill battle. For my organic control I use lizards. Western Fence Swifts or bluebellies. In my backyard I have the most concentrated lizard population I have ever seen. Ants may lose a battle, but they always win the war.

Yea, you could sterilize a 10 acre plot with cobalt 60, and in 2 months it would have several mounds. Best way I've found is to use bifenthrin (a synthetic pyrethrin)based granules. A quick application to mounds that pop up after a rain really keep them under control. Takes only a teaspoon per mound. Yes, they move, but it takes huge energy and resources for sick ants to move. They appear to die by the 2nd or 3rd move. My 1 acre lot in town went from 30 mounds to 2-3 mounds popping up after a rain.

Thank God fire ants cannot live this far north!

Terro seems to be just borax, it will kill ants that ingest it, such as sugar ants that enter the house, but I cant see it exterminating a colony.
As DIED suggested earlier, Termidor, with fipronil, the same ingredient as Frontline for dogs, is slow acting to allow distribution thru out the colony.
Termidor is a termite control system. Over N' Out, in the shiny silver bag is a consumer based fipronil formulation which will work on fire ants. As stated earlier, dont dump a bunch on the mound. Dont disturb the mound. Sprinkle it in the yard so foraging ants can take it home. Just the contact of one ant to another will pass on the slow acting nerve agent.
In a year or 2, change to something like Bifenthrin, or Cyfluthirin based to prevent building up resistance.

Pyrethin? Isn't that flea dip? Place I live is one gigantic ant farm. Maybe 20 square miles, I have no idea where it ends or begins. Plus I have a park next to me, and an organic garden otherwise I would try a lot harsher methods. I just learn to live with them. The Terro has several products, including clear liquod bait my sweet eaters love when nothing else works. And I have tried every single one. To be honest I just raised the white flag here. As long as I keep them out of the food in the pantry, I can live with them.

Yea, but a stronger synthetic type. You sprinkle just a teaspoon around a mound. Next day there is a pile of dead ants that were moved from inside the mound. Next day, the mound has moved, but all the ants are sick and wobbly like they've been lapping Southern Comfort. 1 more application usually finishes the job.

I had an ant farm too, but they're no longer a problem.

OK, I'm sold. I'll give it a try. First try is outside of organic garden. Any places you think has the best price?

Pyrethin is a synthetic compound discoverd from the Chrysanthemum flower and is extremely effective at killing all insects. Depending on dose level, it can kill quickly or slowly. Be very, very careful what you use around your tanks (ponds), as insect larvae are some of the very basic elements of your aquatic food chain and killing them will create hazards for your fish. The labels should tell you whether or not it is acceptable to use near water.

If anybody would like to purchase some, I have a few breeding pairs of fire ants and can ship up north for $1.50 a mile so that y'all can enjoy some of the Southern outdoor delights that we have down here in Texas!

Working in a parks department we use a ant bait called Advion it is listed by Texas A&M as one of the best baits for fast 3-5 day kill and long term. We due two applications per year one in April and another in Aug/Sept. The rate of application is 1.5 lbs per acre.

Beneficial Nematodes... Heard these things are monsters. Kill all insects and dont harm humans, fish, or earthworms. Just Ants, Grubs, bees, termites, ect...