wrote:
On Tue, 19 Jul 2016 05:46:25 -0700 (PDT), Its Me
wrote:

On Tuesday, July 19, 2016 at 7:46:13 AM UTC-4, True North wrote:

On Mon, 18 Jul 2016 19:56:24 -0700 (PDT), Tim
wrote:
- show quoted text -
"If they eat enough to seriously stress the population, they will
simply stop eating it.


I am running into that problem with ants as we speak. I have "crazy
ants" in the house now and these are crazier than most. I don't ever
see them eating anything so baiting is not an option. Perimeter sprays
really only do so much and I really think they are living under the
slab. I don't see then outside anywhere and I have sprayed the outside
around the house.
These guys are really strange. They actually run and hide from you.
They act more like German roaches than ants. If you turn the lights on
you see some but in a few seconds they all disappear.
I saw them in a doughnut box and I thought I had them but they were
not eating the doughnuts, they were just hiding in the box. I left one
out on the counter all day and they never touched it. If I can find
out what they will eat, I can get them. So far, no joy.
I am working on trying to get every penetration in the slab but that
is tough since some are inside the walls, not really near anything I
can get to. They will just pop up somewhere else if you can't kill the
queen anyway. This is the longest I have ever gone without figuring
out what my ants eat and baiting them.
It has been over 20 years since I found a commercial bait that they
would touch. I also have not seen a sugar eating ant in about that
long. These guys can get very selective. The last time I saw an ant
eating anything, it was a dead bug and I think the poison that killed
the bug, killed them so now they don't eat dead bugs.
I guess that is how they survived a few million years."


Our curse is fire ants. Trouble with living in a major port is that
critters hitch hike here from all over.
These ants only infest certain blocks and mine is one for the last
dozen years where the people across the street don't have them. The
experts claim you can trace their progress from the Northend container
pier to the southern. Very hard to kill off due to multiple queens.

Ortho Orthene is the best stuff I've found for killing fire ants. Don't
know if you can get it up there. Unlike the stuff like Amdro, it
doesn't even warn you to not disturb the mound when you apply. But
we're not infested, just have an occasional mound pop up. I don't think
they like our heavy clay soil.

Orthene was what I used on the fire ants here but the ants I have now
don't have mounds to treat. I think they live under concrete slabs and
just pop up through any available penetration or crack. I never see a
mound and treating the edges and penetrations just moves them around.
I am using bifen now, based on advice from the home repair NG.
Lambda-Cyhalothrin based stuff was pretty good but I guess somebody
decided it was too good because HD/Lowes doesn't sell it anymore here.


Sort of like Clordane. Sprayed the foundation of my first house in 1969
and when we left 10 years later, we still had not had an ant invasion.
Here, we have Argentine ants mostly. Years ago, before them, the ants self
limited somewhat as one ant hill, would attack another colony. They figure
Argentine's are a single colony as the DNA is the same. Terro seems to
work on them.