Controlling Ants

'Baits for ant control are great tools. However, sometimes a residual insecticide is more appropriate or must be used to provide control more quickly. The problem with the pyrethroid insecticides is that they are generally very repellent to ants. Ants will tend to avoid them and will change their foraging patterns but the colony will not be eliminated. The problem just moves or spreads rather than disappears.

Phantom is a new, non-repellent insecticide registered for termite control. However, it also has a registration for ant control indoors. Ants apparently cannot detect it and will continue to cross the treated areas until the population is eliminated. The active ingredient in Phantom, chlorfenapyr, is not stable in sunlight so the product has no registration for ants outdoors.

A recent Acrobat ant problem was solved in an office building using Phantom. The ants were apparently nesting in the roof insulation and trailing down through channels in the glass walls to reach an atrium. A large tree in the atrium was infested with scale insects and the honeydew became the food source for the Acrobat ants. The ants would not accept any bait – surprise! Finally, Phantom was applied to the trails and within 24 hours the problem was eliminated.

Another termiticide, Termidor, received EPA registration at the end of August for ant control outdoors. It is registered in almost every state. The active ingredient in Termidor is fipronil. It is also non-repellent to ants but it is stable in sunlight. If you have an ant population trailing on the exterior of a building, Termidor would be the product of choice.

This product works wonders on white-footed ants in Florida. This ant does not pass on toxicants in baits to other ants so baits only kill those ants that feed directly on the bait. There are multiple queens. A colony can contain millions of workers. Repellent insecticides cause the ants to change foraging patterns or, worse yet, become trapped inside and create greater problems. An application of Termidor on trails will eliminate the problem almost over night.

These two new, non-repellent insecticides are great tools in many cases. However, if you have a large population of ants living outdoors but foraging in or on your building and you can’t locate the nest, a repellent insecticide might still be the best choice. The non-repellents will kill ants, but if part of the population is foraging elsewhere, you never eliminate the colony. The ants just keep showing up. The repellent insecticides stop foraging immediately.

So now we have a number of effective baits, two new non-repellent insecticides for indoor and outdoor use and the old repellent products for certain types of infestations.

Maybe we now can deal effectively with any ant infestation. Just hope the ants don’t become as ‘smart’ as the cockroaches.