ants & bulbs
Theladygardens@aol.com (Wed, 28 Jul 2010 12:07:37 PDT)

Yes I have had huge ant problems. As you know an ant nest can easily
cover your entire property. We live on a huge any nest and turning a shovel
over usually involves millions of ants. Ants also feed on termite larvae so
if they are crawling out of electrical sockets all over your house, have
the house treated for termites.
For most garden variety ants, The ant pro system works and you can find
them on line at _www.kmantpro.com_ (http://www.kmantpro.com/) Seems
expensive but it's easy to use, doesn't require much work on your part and will get
the nest in about 3 weeks time. But you need a lot, read their
information to guesstimate how many bait stations you need.
You can also do it yourself cheaper and with a lot more work by using empty
spice jars. Collect as many as you can, mix boric acid, sugar or honey
and water, heat to make sure all is dissolved, cool and put a small amount in
each spice jar, put the lid with holes back on and lay them on their sides
all over your garden. This allows ants to crawl in the small holes but
not most other bugs, lizards, birds, etc. To be effective in killing the
nest make the solution with boric acid a bit weak and each ant can make 7-8
trips back to the nest with the 'food' before he dies. But if you have
enough empty spice bottles maybe you just want to kill as many ants as you can
and keep them coming to the toxic food station. Clean all of the jars out
and refill with fresh mixture often, maybe even daily. Watch the ant
traffic to see how often they need to be cleaned and filled. With the AntPro
system you do it once every few months.
Don't buy pharmacy grade boric acid in small jars for several dollars but
purchase a large container (about quart size) of Roachproof. Read the
ingredients, it's boric acid and is much cheaper allowing you to make a lot.
There are many recipes on-line using boric acid water and sugar or honey.
Using less acid takes longer but allows them to carry lots of food back to
the nest. Good luck!
Carolyn Craft