When do ants come out

Ants often move inside looking for better conditions, food, moisture, shelter, favorable temperatures and permanent residence. Ant activity indoors generally may actually decrease in winter, but observing ants swarmers or foragers during the cold weather months may indicate that an ant colony exists somewhere inside the home.

In this scenario, ants are usually located somewhere in an inner house wall, in door and window frames, or in hidden places. Escaping cold weather is not the only reason ants get inside the home in the winter.

Ants are omnivores and may be attracted to the interior of a home by substances that are edible and provide a good energy source. So, keep things clean since ants will not survive or may go elsewhere if they have no food to provide life-sustaining energy.

Should ants become established indoors, whether in the warm or cool months of the year, it is usually very difficult to get control over them.

Therefore, it may be advisable to contact your pest management professional PMP just as soon as you observe ant swarmers or ants foraging for food and let them conduct an inspection and prepare a science-based ant management plan that is tailored to your situation. One other good reason to seek the expertise and help of your pest control company is the swarm you see may not be ants, but could be termites instead. The pest management plan will include recommendations for sanitation, exclusion and reduction of potential ant habitat.

However, excluding all ant methods of ingress into a home is a very exacting practice and just one more reason to employ the expertise of your pest management professional. While the possibility exists for numerous and various ant species to invade the home during winter, the more likely species move inside from the outdoors are Acrobat ants , Argentine ants , Carpenter ants , Crazy ants , Dark rover ants, Ghost ants , Odorous ants , Pharaoh ants and White-footed ants.

Read more about ants here. Preventative means are probably the best way to stop ants intruding into the home. Keeping a clean house, cleaning up any spills straight away, and cleaning down food preparation areas will help.

Remove any rotten fruit or vegetables, and keep sugar based products such as jams and cakes out of reach in sealed containers. Natural products such as salt, turmeric powder or paprika sprinkled around known points of entry can deter ants.

Once the ants are inside, however, scooping them up and putting them out, or killing them on the spot, will unlikely put an end to more visitors coming due to the scent trails already laid.

However you choose to remove the ants, the area where they have been will need to be cleaned thoroughly with a strong soap or window cleaner to remove the scent trail. Household insecticides can be applied around the entry points, and also around the nest in the garden if located. Yet with the sheer quantity of ants and the low dosages of these insecticides this may well prove to be a short term solution.

For serious ant problems, a professional pest controller should be used. Ants that reside in the UK are pretty much harmless. Ants that are found in the garden or black in colour will not bite and do not carry disease.

However, ants that have found their way into your home may have journeyed through grimy places and can spread contamination throughout your living areas. Ants in the UK are not seen as a threat and can, in fact, kill other pests such as flies and fleas.

Because ants do not come alone and travel in their masses, they can find their way into the smallest of spaces and although ants are generally not dirty, their bodies can pick up dirt along the way. Ants found in the UK are not poisonous. They may bite and sting but they are harmless to humans. Types of dangerous ants across the world include:. Ants can ruin the foundations of a home and cause a lot of damage.

Ants are on a constant search for a good food source. Ants can enter your home in various ways including under slabs, through cracks and floorboards. Watch the ant trail and follow the direction they are coming from to find out where they are entering your home.

Pest Defence are experts in providing safe, efficient solutions to your pest problems, including invasions of ants and other insects. If you would like to know more about what we do, please feel free to get in touch with us today.

See if we cover your area ». Great news, we cover in your area, please give us a call on:. Sorry, we currently do not cover in your area. If outdoor nests are suspected, the homeowner should also inspect around the foundation of the building at night with a flashlight, especially around doors, weep holes and openings such as where utility pipes and wires enter the structure. The baiting approach using honey can also be used to trace carpenter ants which are foraging outdoors back to their nest.

Oftentimes, it will be difficult or impossible to locate and destroy the carpenter ant nest s. In this case, the homeowner may wish to call a professional pest control operator. Pest control companies approach carpenter ant problems differently. Some attempt to locate the nest and selectively treat only in specific areas.

Other companies take more of a "shot-gun" approach, drilling and dusting as many potential wall voids and nesting sites as possible. Most companies also apply a perimeter spray treatment around the outside foundation of the home in an effort to temporarily prevent reinvasion. The approach which should not be used is simply to spray each month where carpenter ants are seen.

If no effort is made to locate the nest s or probable nest areas, the problem will most likely continue. Typically, there will be wide differences in price depending on the company and amount of effort expended. Since carpenter ant problems are not always solved on the first attempt, the type of guarantee and reputation of the company should be factored into the purchasing decision.

A number of steps can be taken by homeowners to reduce the potential for future carpenter ant problems. The use of some products may not be legal in your state or country. Please check with your local county agent or regulatory official before using any pesticide mentioned in this publication.

Carpenter Ants. Carpenter Ant Life Cycle. Ant vs. Correct roof leaks, plumbing leaks and other moisture problems which will attract carpenter ants. Eliminate wood-to-ground contact such as where landscaping has moved soil or mulch up against the wood siding of a home. Clip back tree limbs and vegetation touching the roof or siding of the house.

Limbs and branches serve as "bridges" between carpenter ants nesting in a dead tree limb and the structure.