Ants!

Carpenter ants DO NOT eat wood. They remove wood as they create galleries and tunnels. How is that better?

My first indication something was up came last night as I walked into the family room. Ants! There weren’t that many… though how many do you need before it’s “that many?” I went after them with a vengeance… and paper towels.

By the time I went to bed I figured it was “Mission Accomplished.” That phrase never works!

We’ve got carpenter ants. They’re big and black and can move fast. The extension service at the University of Minnesota says:

Carpenter ants DO NOT eat wood. They remove wood as they create galleries and tunnels.

How is that better?

This morning Helaine woke up to an ant convention! Mostly they were in the sun room, but they were spilling over into the family room as well.

Here’s the problem. Tuesday we’re getting our floors refinished.

“They’ll be fossilized,” Helaine noted. The idea of ants embedded in polyurethane was not appealing.

We needed an exterminator and pronto! Of course it is a holiday weekend. I went to Facebook.

Anyone know of an exterminator who can solve a problem today in Hamden? Please be in touch.

A number of my Facebook friends sent names and suggestions, but one stood out. He actually is an exterminator!

Geoff, call me at 203-803-7273. I am the branch manager for Braman Pest Elimination and I am on call today.

That note came from Will Carney, as of today my hero. I’ve left his number up because one good deed deserves another. If you need an exterminator there he is!

Within a few minutes Will had found the nest and smote the beasts. The weekend can continue; the floors can be renewed.

Mission accomplished? I hope so.

12 thoughts on “Ants!”

  1. Let’s hear it for Facebook friends! We have the tiny ants here – bazillions of them. Pavement ants? Sugar ants? Here they are mailbox ants and front porch ants. Yuck! But better than snakes and gators brought in by floods.

  2. It is almost a certainty that you have wet wood somewhere. Wood touching the ground, a leak or gutter problem that allows water behind siding. Something like that. The only way to permanently get rid of carpenter ants is to find the wet spot and repair it. Otherwise, they will return every wet season. Dry structures do not get carpenter ants. Obviously the place to look first is in the vicinity of the nest that was found. I also applaud your use of the word “smote”. Very artfully done!

  3. Every year they come to my house. I’ve seen to first few. When they become more numerous, I, too, will call an exterminator I hired for mice I didn’t have. Call me paranoid. I know ants when I see them, however.

  4. Ants are not as bad as termites. We were cursed with them when we lived on Long Island. It took years to find the master nest. Not fun during a swarm!

  5. Thanks for sharing the exterminator info…I’ll keep them in mind if I need them. These critters are so hard to get rid of. We’ve had them for years…some years in between they’ve disappeared but then they always seem to find a way back! I’ve seen them climb up a tree, walk across the telephone wires right into our attic! The ants going marching on…
    So far I haven’t seen any in the house this year (hopefully I haven’t’ just jinxed that) but I have seen them milling around outside so I know they are close by! Keeping my fingers crossed! On a positive note at least they are not cockroaches…that would be much worse!

  6. I had two carpenter ants in the garage the other night one was an inch long and the other was even longer, got the shorter of the two but couldn’t kill the other one, very fast as you said. Home remedy for the small ants is at the ant nest sprinkle some cornmeal around it the ants take it inside and it swells once it gets moist and then the ants suffocate.

  7. Thank you for sharing the exterminator info. We’re getting them too as they are all over the place and mostly in the kitchen area.

  8. With my experience with carpenter ants I had a few years ago, exterminator told me there was a dead tree or dead branch of a tree nearby.Yup there is was,tree branch gone and no more ants.

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