The latest in my string of disasters.........

I've leaned the entire mobile home park I live in (including my home) is badly infested with sugar ants.

2 of there favorite places to build nest are inside of cd cases & electronics (stereo gear, pc's, etc)

AAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!

Since you capitalized both words I honestly thought this was about a new band!

I did too! Almost didn't open the thread because "eh, I never heard of them".

Hope you get things sorted out Geff.

A friend said she just killed a colony with plain vinegar, so I'm trying that before loading the furballs in the car & spending $500 for pest control.

I have tried the vinegar. You have to do it in a very specific way or it won't work. Let me look...

Here is the page I used. I think I tried all the solutions on it, so I don't know if the vinegar was the one that did it or not. The ants were gone though.



http://www.wikihow.com/Kill-Ants-without-Pesticides

Pesticides do NOT work at all and are a waste of time. They kill some ants, but the "take it back to the colony and kill them all" is BS. They just keep storming back. I hate them.

Jeff, thanks!

Other than the picking up the dead ants, that's what I'm doing so far (I was told to go 60/40 vinegar to water). Guess I need to do that also.

On the 2nd try, it does seem to have done some good. I was told it would likely take 3 days of constant repetitions to do the job, but I agree I'd MUCH prefer this to pesticides.

The big concern here, is that supposedly the mobile home park has literally thousands of nests;. I hope they stay gone if they do go away!

If this works, it's on to the fleas (I haven't seen any, but a friend swears she saw 3 here. She's also my handyperson, & she won't come in the house until I tell her it's been treated for fleas. Not sure if I really have any, as my cats were certified flea free by a vet the day before I moved.

Fumigation is the key, did you have the property inspected before you brought it?
Ants can cause severe structural damage if not treated.

Yes, home inspector did a terrible job.

These are sugar ants; my understanding is that carpenter ants do the structural damage?

So the old borax and sugar mix (dry or in water, with syrup or without) isn't doing it? 1 part borax, 3 parts sugar, usually does it.

It usually works for me - though if you kill one nest, a neighboring nest is likely to exist and will take over the vacated territory quickly, so in an ant infested zone, it might look like it's not even working. So multiple treatments will likely be required since, well, you apparently got what they want. It might be food, but it might also just be a decent source of water (condensation on your pipes or whatnot). Find where they are coming in and lay down the poison. You'll have to devise some closed container traps (with a small opening - like an CoolWhip bowl with a slot cut into it) if pets or kids might get into it.

Anyway, sugar ants are mostly annoying rather than destructive, but I'd still wage a war against them to rid them from your home.

Good luck.

Problem with that is it can kill or seriously injure cats.

It isn't just my home, it's thee entire mobile home park is totally infested with the things.

Current battle plan is vinegar, outside poison, & possibly corn meal (waiting to check with the vet on the last one, to make sure Corn meal is safe for cats.

I have so far only seen about 10% the amount of ants that I saw yesterday (cross my fingers).

Borax isn't particularly toxic for larger creatures. They'd have to eat a LOT of it, and you don't put out a lot of it. But if pets are a problem, a container is the way to go, particularly since cats don't go after sugar and there's nothing that smells tempting inside the thing. Don't lace the stuff with meat and you should be fine. A box of borax isn't terribly expensive, will sit on the shelf for years no problem, and can be mixed up to kill ants for you in a few minutes and will be there for the rest of your life.

But if white vinegar is working for you (never even heard of that one, so I don't know why sugar ants would even take it - do they think it's water?) then all's well.