Recently in Ants in your house or yard Category

Hey,

I was just wondering if you knew what type of ants these critters are? I live in Florida if that helps.

K. Brown

*****

Hello,

These appear to be ghost ants (Tapinoma melanocephalum), a notorious so-called "tramp" species that is well-established in Florida. The species epithet melanocephalum literally means "brown head", owing to its distinctive bicoloration. Here is a previous post that addresses the role of ghost ants as pests in the home and also provides links to a number of articles that can tell you more about the appearance and ecology of this species.

Thanks,

Alexandra Westrich & the AntAsk Team

Dear AntAsk,
I live in Puerto Rico and am wondering about a tiny ant whose bite
continues to burn after it bites and likes to eat cotton clothing. And
scurries in and out of electronic equipment like my comptuer keyboard
and my other electronic things like the dials on my electric guitar.
They also like paper. and books - I see them outside where they like
very dry wood and leaves - and digest dry wood as well. They look just
like ants - act just like ants - How do I get rid of them as I can't
spray my equipment. and my clothes.

Thanks

Sonja

Dear Sonja,

Thanks for contacting AntBlog. Chances are you have one of two species: Wasmannia auropunctata or Monomorium destructor. Wasmannia workers are all the exact same size and their bodies tend to be all the same color (they can be light or dark, but it's usually one or the other). Monomorium destructor are red-brown in the front part of their bodies, and darker in the back. Their workers are different sizes: within one foraging trail, you'll often see workers that are twice as big as the smallest ones, and there will be sizes between those two. Monomorium destructor has more of a tendancy to damage clothing (like you mentioned) and electrical equipment, but both species (and many others) will nest in a variety of small containers like electrical boxes and clothing drawers.

In previous posts (click here, here, here ), we've outlined some general strategies for getting rid of ants using commercially availible poisons like Borax. I would add putting items in the freezer for 24 hours will often kill them in small electronic items (and anything else you can fit in the freezer).

You also might want to check out the website of our friend, Cas Vanderwoude in Hawaii:
http://www.littlefireants.com/
He has some useful tips there for how to get rid of Wasmannia auropunctata, and the research his team is doing to fight this invasive species.

Good luck! Sorry you're having so much trouble with these ants!
Best,
Jesse Czekanski-Moir & the AntAsk Team

Dear AntAsk,
My name is Hadar and I live in Israel. I am the owner of the company for pest control in Israel that specializes in the extermination of ants using baits
During the last five years we are dealing with the failure of eradication of the species Plagiolepis. We've tried most types of bait offered the U.S. pesticide market without success. Needless to say that spraying pesticides is not effective at all.
We tried various baits containing borax or fipronil or abamectin B1 imidiachloropid.
The baits contain honey dew or protein. Often appears in the attraction of that work and "workers" vigorously and after a while sometimes minutes, sometimes days after the placement of abandoned ant bait
Can I get some information about the lifestyles of this ant? Such as:
What kind of diet prefers this species?
Is there more than one queen in the nest?
How to deal with this pest
This species is very common throughout the country from north to south
Unfortunately, an Israeli research on this species is not done yet
Please help
Sincerely
Hadar

Dear Hadar,

Sorry to hear that you're having trouble with Plagiolepis. Although only a few species have been studied in depth, it seems that there is evidence of polygyny (multiple queens in the same colony) in every species in which this quality has been looked for ( P. pygmaea, P. xene, P. taurica, P. schmitzii, and P. maura - data and references in Thurin et al. 2011; DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-294X.2011.05161.x).

As for what your Plagiolepis eats in the wild, it is likely that even if we did know what species you were working with, there would not be a complete, published study that would answer this question. What is more important is that you continue to experiment with baits to which this ant might be attracted that you can mix with the appropriate poisons. Invasive ant expert Cas Vanderwoude (http://www.littlefireants.com) explains:

We have Plagiolepis alluaudi here in Hawai`i. They seem fairly "skittish" and do not seem to feed on any particular food source. I think they are present in homes more for water than anything else.

My standard approach would be to offer a buffet of food items that they might feed on, add a toxicant to the most attractive item and bait with that mixture. So Hadar, try a little (1)peanut butter, (2) jam or jelly, and (3) spam or tuna or fish flavored cat food. Also, try water. Put it in a vial filled with cotton wadding so the ants can "suck" the water from the wadding. You might be surprised - it might be water they recruit to most! If that's the case, thank my friend Evan Harris for that suggestion... if water and sugar are both attractive, you can make a nice attractant out of sugar water (25% sugar) and place it in the vials mentioned previously.

Adding a toxicant is the next step. If you have fipronil it will be the most effective. The most important thing is the dose. DO NOT OVER-DOSE!!! For fipronil, use only 0.1g/kg bait mix - NO MORE! The effective range will be 0.01-0.1 g/kg active ingredient. Any more and it will take effect too soon and leave the queen(s) unaffected. Repeat baiting every 6-8 weeks."

In addition to Cas's tips, I would add that it is important to apply poison at an effective spatial scale. If you're going to poison the ants in one person's house, but they live two meters away from a large colony, there is a very strong likelihood of re-infestation. Cas's point about re-applying baits is also very important; no treatment will kill 100% the first time. Often, treatments will kill around 90% of the ants at most, so it is important to keep re-applying the pesticide at the right time intervals. Ants do not eat while they are in their pupal stage (something like the cocoon a caterpillar makes before becoming a butterfly), so re-applying pesticides while the same ants are in their pupal stages will not increase the effectiveness of the treatment.

For further information about dealing with invasive ants, I'd encourage you to check out Cas's website (above). For example, there is some information on treating potted plants for pests by submerging them in water at 45C which might be useful for some situations.

I hope this helps!
Best,
Jesse Czekanski-Moir, Cas Vanderwoude, and the AntAsk Team

Hello,

I would like to know if there is any sense to make out of the strange behavior I witnessed an ant making in my house.

I live in Long Island, NY and I guess the type of ant was a regular black carpenter ant. The first thing that struck me odd was that it had a very narrow thorax, almost like it was pinched in...But that might be 100% normal and I've just never looked that hard at an ant before.

The second thing that struck me odd was that it was standing still and seemed to be jittering its legs while they were planted on the floor, almost like wobbling them. I thought maybe it was neurological damage? Poison? I don't know.

I decided to get some cookie crumbs and a plastic cup so I can try to feed it and observe it for a little while. It did eat a bit which made me feel better. The next strange behavior I saw was that it started grooming the hell out of itself, almost manically as if it was on speed, then it proceed to bite at the bottom tip of it's abdomen. It was freaky; I thought maybe it was pregnant and ready to pop out some eggs or something. I don't think it was, though. It was really weird. I hope he wasn't sick or poisoned. I named him Mercury. I got grossed out from lying on the kitchen floor to watch all this and let it go off into the sunset...

Thanks!

Cheryl Cusimano

*****

Hi Cheryl,

The ant you found was very likely a carpenter ant, but without a more thorough description or any photographic cues, this might be hard to confirm. The "narrow thorax" you observed could have been either the petiole of an ant (the small segment joining the mesosoma and gaster that gives all ants and many other hymenopterans the appearance of having a "waist") or the constricted petiolar segment of a parasitoid wasp. Ensign wasps (family Evaniidae), for example, superficially resemble black carpenter ants and are familiar (if less common) interlopers in domestic settings given their predatory association with cockroaches.

The jittering movement is likewise difficult to explain without further observation. If the insect was indeed an ensign wasp, you might compare this behavior with descriptions of the wasp's peculiar bobbing movements, which involve jerking its abdomen up and down like a hatchet.

The meticulous grooming behavior you observed is characteristic of almost all insects, especially after a meal. Whether this particular individual was an ant or a wasp, obsessive self-grooming would not be unexpected following close inspection of foreign objects like cookie crumbs or plastic cups.

Hope this helps,

Alexandra Westrich & the AntAsk Team

I took pictures of 2 Guardian Ants working Woolly Aphids. I am trying to find the name of the ant species that is acting as guardian to this mass of Woolly Aphids, Prociphilus tessellatus, on a growing Alder shrub next to a lake.

The area this Speckled Alder is growing in is very sparse during the winter with snow and ice licking at its branches. Where would these ants keep these aphids over the winter? Do aphids, and ants have sort of anti-freeze in there system that kicks in during the winter?

Since this was on a lake shore, and at the end of a wooded hill to the lake, do I need to be concerned relative to my plants about 500 feet away? If so what do you suggest?

Thank you,
Richard and Meghan
**********

Dear Richard and Meghan,

Thank you for contacting AntBlog and send such nice photographs. This certainly helps with identifications. Since you are in New England, we reached out to an expert in the area, Stefan Cover, for help. Here is what he said:

"Those ants are Camponotus noveboracensis. The Camponotus are frequent aphid tenders but we know nothing about the relationship between these ants and that particular aphid. No need to worry about plants 500 feet away, though."

In addition, if you would like to read more about what ants do in the winter, please see our previous post here.

Best regards,
Stefan Cover (guest expert), Corrie Moreau & the AntAsk Team

Hello from Mesa, AZ!!

Sooo... We moved into this house this past June and was horrified to see such large (large by this mid-westerners standards) ants, in very, very large numbers on our back patio one morning. That's when the war was waged. I love planet earth, and I respect the Eco system but I have a fearless 2 year old, which kind of changes my perspective on what I will allow in the backyard.

A little bit about our backyard guests. They don't like the heat. They are most active at dusk and dawn. They spread around their colony hole then have deliberate lines to food sources. Basically, they act like every other ant I've ever encountered. However, they have a very strong exoskelaton, and need to be repeatedly stepped on before being crushed. Apparently, the lizards in our yard.don't eat them, since they have such large numbers.

To date we've had an exterminator spray multiple times, landscaper used fire ant pellets, and this evening, out of frustration, I took a pick axe, lighter fluid, newspaper and a lighter to the colony. I wasn't sure if they stung before lighting them on fire, and quickly learned that they do sting/bite and.... it really hurts; which is upsetting because I don't want my curious toddler to have to endure this pain.

So... As I iced my ankle, while watching SpongeBob, and supressed the helpless feeling in the pit of my stomach, I found your site. And how WONDERFUL of a site it is!! After combing through it, I couldn't find my critters. So, here is my plea. What are these large black ants and how do I get them to move to my neighbors yard (or, how do I kill them?). My apologies for not having better pictures, it was the best I could do.

Best Regards,
Jacquelin

*****
Dear Jacquelin,

We are sorry to hear you are having a problem with the ants in your yard. Moving from the midwest to the deserts of Arizona means you will have to adjust to your new neighbors and this includes the ants. On a positive note, many of those new neighbors (including the ants) are really amazing! In fact, Arizona has over 300 species of ants. Antweb has a page dedicated to the ants of Arizona: http://www.antweb.org/arizona.jsp

The ants you have in your yard are harvester ants in the genus Pogonomyrmex (probably Pogonomyrmex rugosus). These ants are primary seed harvesters, although they will also collect dead insects and other foods. You can read more about this species and see photos here. You can also find distribution maps for the North American species of Pogonomyrmex here.

Although these ants do have a painful sting when disturbed they are not likely to enter your home. I know that you are concerned about your child, but I would talk to other parents in the area to see how they have learned to live with these ants. Harvester ants are a common and important part of the desert ecosystem, so trying to find a way to coexist with them will be easier in the long run than trying to get rid of them. If you are determined to get rid of the harvester ants in your yard read here and here.

I hope you find a way to enjoy these beautiful ants (see close up photo here)!

Best regards,
Corrie Moreau & the AntAsk Team

Hi,
We live in Puerto Rico, where ants are varied, plentiful, painful (lots of fire ants...) and often like to move into our (concrete block) house.

We've been having frequent infestations of these little (2mm or so) ants. At first I thought they were pharaoh ants but now I'm thinking the coloration is wrong (these guys have light colored abdomens and dark heads, not the other way around). We have been trying to get rid of them using Maxforce and more recently Advion. They swarm the bait and then wander around like they are dazed and confused, sometimes seem to dwindle a bit but they don't die out. They seem to like to make nests in small openings in our walls (e.g., breaks in the grout lines but they also like our kitchen cabinets (but don't seem to bother getting into the food, just collect crumbs etc.) and have even once moved into our clothing chest of drawers (we don't notice their new trail quickly enough).

Seems I need to know exactly what they are to get rid of 'em effectively so would very much appreciate your thoughts.

Best,
Miri

*****
Dear Miri,

We are sorry to hear you are having problems with ants in your home. The ants you are finding are the ghost ant, Tapinoma melanocephalum. This species is a pest in many places in the world.

You can read more about this species of ant here, here, and here.

In addition, you may try some of our suggestions for other pest ants in homes from this previous post here.

Best regards,
Corrie Moreau & the AntAsk Team

Dear AntWeb,

We think there are ant nests in our home but would like to confirm with you first. Please bear with us as we describe the whole situation below.

Background:
About 3 weeks ago, one morning we saw a pile of sawdust at a very small ridgeline crack where the base of the bathtub meets the floor at (on the outside of the tub, there are separate bathtub and shower stall in our bathroom). There are also about 5 winged ants sluggishly crawling around on the floor. We thought they could be termites so we check the pictures and verified that they were not termites (pinched waist), probably carpenter ants. We killed the ants and removed them along with the sawdust pile. Three days later, we saw the same things, sawdust pile and sluggish winged ants at the same location. This time, after we killed and removed the winged ants and sawdust, we used the 'Raid Ant & Roach spray' at the crack and all along that area.

A few days passed and there were no more ants so we thought all the ants were gone (mistakenly). But we still used the same Raid Ant spray evryday to make sure. Then 2 weeks ago, one morning, we saw about 50 winged ants, some dead, some sluggish, on the bathroom floor and along the window sill. We started to spray more but every morning, we still saw them, but less (about 30). We sprayed at the crack, around this area and at the window sill. After reading about the winged males/females mating, we're really worried.

Questions:

1. Does this mean we have a (or more) carpenter ant colony nesting inside somewhere our bathroom?
2. If there are ant nests in our house, then why do we only see the winged ants (supposedly out for mating), but we do not see the wingless worker ants inside the home?
3. Did the winged male ants die right after mating? Or they died because of the 'Raid Ant spray' that we used at the crack and window sill?
4. What are your conclusion and suggestions on how to resolve the ant problem.

Please let us know. Your responses are much appreciated. :)

Thanks so much for your help,
Homeowners with Ant Problem

*****
Dear Homeowners with Ant Problem,

Although most ants are happy living outside, there are a few pest ant species that find living in our homes preferable. Unfortunately this includes carpenter ants!

If what you are seeing are carpenter ants (or termites - check out this post to tell the difference) it is important that you contact a pest control group that is familiar with these insects to have them eradicated. As these insects can cause structural damage to your home it is important that you have an experienced pest control expert exterminate them.

For general tips about controlling ants in your home, please check out this previous post here.

One thing to note that since ants live in colonies, unlike most other home pest insects, using insect killing sprays will not really fix the problem. When you spray the ants you are seeing, you are only making a dent in the colony as a whole. You need to kill the queen, which is deep in the colony, to insure the death of the whole ant colony.

Regarding your specific questions, I will address each below:

Q1. Does this mean we have a (or more) carpenter ant colony nesting inside somewhere our bathroom?

A: This is likely, although they could be living outside of your home and only venturing in. But since you are seeing them in large numbers, I suspect they are living in your home.

Q2. If there are ant nests in our house, then why do we only see the winged ants (supposedly out for mating), but we do not see the wingless worker ants inside the home?

A: Although carpenter ants like living in our homes, they do not necessarily like to eat the same food we do, which is why you rarely seem them foraging in your home. The sexuals (virgin queens and males) are trying to find a way out to go on their mating flight.

Q3. Did the winged male ants die right after mating? Or they died because of the 'Raid Ant spray' that we used at the crack and window sill?

A: I doubt the ants have had a chance to mate yet (they usually require a mating flight or swarm). They are likely dying due to the insecticide.

Q4. What are your conclusion and suggestions on how to resolve the ant problem.

A: As mentioned above, it is good idea to contact a pest control specialist who is familiar with exterminating carpenter ants and termites.

Best of luck,
Corrie Moreau & the AntAsk Team

Hello,
I've been feeding some ants on my desk which I believe to be Tapinoma sessile. I tracked them quite a long way to the front door of my house. Recently I discovered that some of the ants are coming from the opposite direction from my window which is halfway around the house. Is there a way to tell if they are from the same colony?
I've read that T. sessile is very tolerant of other ants so I don't expect any fighting. I tried to see if the ants coming from one way would go the other way. This leads me to my next question, would ants from the same species but different colonies be able to recognize each other's pheronomes as if it were their own?

Thanks,
Rex

Hi Rex!

Thanks for contacting us at AntAsk! To tell whether ants are from the same colony, I would suggest that you carefully collect one ant from one of the groups and place it in the other group. Of course, if fighting takes place, the ants were from different colonies. But also if the ants start inspecting each other carefully with their antennae and might even pull each other at the mandibles, this suggests they are from a different colony. If the ants act as nothing has happend and the experimentally introduced individual just runs with the others, they might indeed be from the same colony.

Researchers often use behavioral observations to determine colony boundaries. Other tools are the analysing cuticular hydrocarbons and/or genetic markers such as microsatellites. Social insects such as ants use low-volatile chemicals (usually hydrocarbons) that are present on the cuticle to distinguish nestmates from foreign individuals. If the hydrocarbons of two ant colonies are very similar, which might be due to the fact that the colonies are related to some extend, ants might have a hard time to determine who is a nestmate and who is not.

I hope this answers your questions!
All the best,
Steffi Kautz & the AntAsk Team

Hi there,
I live NW of Stony Plain, Alberta in the country and I have these ants living in the roots of my shrub and bush. The plants weren't thriving after 3 years of trying to establish so, I dug them up only to find ant nests! I've never seen them above ground and when digging the plants out, they didn't bite at all. Could you please tell me what kind of ants these are and how to get rid of them? (Sorry about the picture quality)

Thank you so much, in advance!
Erika

Dear Erika,

Thank you for contacting AntAsk at AntBlog. We are sorry to hear that your house plants have not been doing very well. Thanks for sending in the image of the ants you found in the roots.

To help answer your question about the ants you are finding, we asked an expert on several groups of subterranean ants Dr. John LaPolla. Here is what he had to say:

"They are Lasius (probably belonging to the old genus Acanthomyops) ants. These ants are known to enter into relationships with aphids and mealybugs on the roots of plants - so that is probably what is accounting for the decline in the plants - not the ants directly, but rather their cattle if you will. They are formicines ants (all of these ants have lost their sting and replaced it with an acid-spraying nozzle), so they cannot sting, but if you smell these ants they probably smell a bit like citronelle, sometimes the common name for this group of Lasius."

Thank you for contacting AntBlog,
John LaPolla, Corrie Moreau & the AntAsk Team