apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

depends what kind of ants, really. I had sugar ants and I put borax in the hole in the wall, caulked that hole - and interestingly enough they didn't like Method grapefruit cleaner, either, and avoided any surface cleaned with it. They moved into my yard and I haven't seen them since.

I live in a basement apartment so I get minor ant influxes (is that the plural of influx??) from time to time. I have cats and a bunny so I am careful what I put on the floor. I have tile floors only though. I don't think this would work with carpet.

I have had great luck deterring ants from coming into the apartment by sprinkling cinnamon or cayenne powders on the doorways. If they get inside, then I make a line of cinnamon or cayenne (both have worked so I pick whichever I have in greater volume) on the floor that they don't cross.

Borax. It works and it's harmless to humans (supposedly). I'd doublecheck on pet-friendliness if I had a dog, tho.

i just stayed in a house over vacation that had an enormous ant problem in the kitchen and first floor bathroom... what i found help was what Erica in DC wrote... i sprinkled cinnamon and cayenne pepper where they were coming in and it helped. we have pets so i helped that it was a windowsill that they were coming in from... before once i did the baking powder and salt mixture....at least i think that's what it was, it might have just been baking soda, i don't recall entirely. but it worked.

at least google baking soda and ants and see what happens. i think it's something like they may come in for a few hours but they are collecting the baking soda for the queen bee and it works like the alka seltzer method for seagulls that you hear about--- they explode and the colony explodes as well. it's not instantaneous like chemicals but it will kill off a colony at a time. anyone else find this too?

ps. cinnamon and cayenne is only temporary, beware. ants avoid it like the plague because they can't breathe around it so they may find another opening in your house that isn't sprinkled with those spices.

http://www.pesticide.org/factsheets.html#alternatives

this is a great website with info on how to get rid of all kinds of pests and weeds in a non-toxic way. i think this is where i learned that it's really important to keep the kitchen dry as well as clean to get rid of the ants - sometimes they are thirsty. So dry the area around the sink and wipe up any drips of water on the floor. I had ants in the spring and made sure the kitchen was spotless and dry for a week, and never had a problem again.

We have ants and I've been slowly battling them as well, but nothing seems to work. (closing up the hole helps but I have a lot of holes in my floor) My ants couldn't care less about cayenne and just walk over it.

Has anyone heard of or tried Safer brand ant killer? I saw it in a green store and- though I've tried to avoid poison - I am tempted to buy it.

I've also tried Cream of Wheat. I haven't had the best luck with this-- they swarmed at carried it away and are supposed to explode when they eat it. Maybe i just have too many ants and didn't put enough CoW out... their numbers didn't decline though, that i could tell.

Ants don't like baby (or talcum) powder either. It's harmless to humans and pets.

I would attempt to identify the ants prior to doing any sort of pest control, even cleaning. You didn't say how small these ants are but if they are teeny tiny, they could be pharaoh ants. Many of the remedies above will stress a pharaoh colony and can cause pharaoh ant colonies to "bud" where a subset (or several) of the colony to set off and start a whole new colony. Proper identification of the ant type will help you determine the most effective green way to fight it.

Best of luck.

Diatomasious Earth will take care of all hard bodied insects. It's natural, plentiful and harmless to humans and mammals.

Could do without the giant closeup of the ant.

An anteater. What's more green than that?

I think cinnamon & plugging holes is your best bet to keep them out (for most ants) and diluted ammonia is the best bet to eliminate their chemical trail (I'd only use it outdoors though). That combo worked for me in a thoroughly infested building. I also made a spray bottle of soapy water to kill (while saying a prayer for them) & clean up the ones that got in.
I got this in an email (after moving out of the infested building, so I never tried it): "Put small piles of cornmeal where you see ants. They eat it, take it "home," & can't digest it so it kills them. It may take a week or so, esp. if it rains, but it works & you don't have the worry about pets or small children being harmed!"

Vinegar - Vinegar - Vinegar - Vinegar - Vinegar - Vinegar

Nothing works better, just spray it at the windows and door steps.

Regarding Safer fire ant killer. I used it as directed and it killed the ants. It also killed the grass where the ant mound was, the liriope around it. I also used it in a very large container which ants moved into after it rained and it killed one of my prize tree roses. I had to mix it in a bucket and what spilled on the grass caused about twenty earthworms to come shooting out of the soil, writhing around violently until they died in a few minutes. When I contacted the company, their only response was that I should have tested it somewhere first (?!?!?) Anyway, I do not recommend the product at all. Incidentally, my sister and I bought it the same day and she had similar problems with plants dying.

Yes, please no extreme closeups of insects? It made the hairs on the back of my neck stand. This is so important to me that I braved looking at it again to get to this page.

Simple Green kills ants when sprayed with it and it seems to keep them out. I sprayed the perimeter of my kitchen when they suddenly emerged in Spring (ground floor apartment with kitchen abutting garden) and only recently have I had a visitation. Maybe because it's been so rainy here in Chicago?
Good luck!

Check out this website. Apparently, you can have savoury or sweet ants. Just test with cheese or sugar. Whichever they prefer, mix half-and-half with borax.

http://www.abc.net.au/hobart/stories/s1836222.htm

Good luck with this. They're disgusting.

djftex- thanks for the Safer review. I live on the 6th floor of an apt building, and so have no plants to kill, but I don't want anything so toxic around me. I'll keep looking for other solutions.

I love the photo!

Fresh mint works well, too--along the same lines as the peppermint oil. If you have a plant, clip the springs, rub them over cracks in doorways, etc., and then leave the sprig there. They don't like the smell or are allergic to the oil or something.

Dry grits work, too. If you sprinkle them on the bed, the ants eat them and their stomachs blow up. You can mix them with any poison you use on beds--kind of as bait since the grits will stick to the flecks of whatever pesticide you're using. I'd be afraid to sprinkle grits inside for fear of attracting roaches.

Did you guys know that there are single fire ant colonies that span multiple states? They are very interesting creatures. I heard a lecture in college called "The Ant That Ate the South." They are incredibly prolific.

I second chartreuse: diatomaceous earth. It's mostly silica, so you wouldn't want to inhale too much of it.

It may work the same as the baby powder suggested, although it's probably cheaper.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diatomaceous_earth

Cinnamon worked great for me, and has the advantage of smelling good, too. Just sprinkled some where they were coming into my bedroom - no more ants.

When we had problems with ants Baking Soda always kept them away, as did dryer sheets... dryer sheets may not be so green but were an easy thing to place in odd corners without having powder or sprays everywhere and didn't cause problems with pets.

There is a product called Orange Guard that I have used before. It worked so well that we didn't see any bugs in the kitchen for nearly a year, including the annual spring roly-poly invasion.

It's supposed to be really safe. The basis of the product is water and extract of orange peel. It smells just like concentrated orange peel, so it's kinda strong, but the smell doesn't last too long. The website is orangeguard.com. Just to be clear, no, I don't work for them. I just find the product really effective, and it doesn't bother my roommate, who has chemical allergies, or me, and I'm allergic to nearly everything else.