Most people consider ants to be pests. They are not a direct pest to plants but their burrows in the soil can loosen the roots of young plants and cause them to die. But on the positive side, if you have heavy clay soil these burrows can break up the soil and loosen it for better aeration and soil drainage. This may not provide you with enough positive soil amendment to want to keep ants around though.
Often gardeners will see ants crawling all over their flower buds, flowers and plants, but rest assured, the ants are not doing any harm. They are collecting the sweet nectar, an important food source for them. Another disadvantage of ants is that they farm aphids. They protect colonies of aphids so they can suck all of the nutrients out of your garden plants, and then milk the aphids for their sweet honeydew that they produce. This cycle creates more aphids and increased damage to your plants.
GARDENING GURU TIP: get rid of aphids as soon as you see them on your plants with a strong, steady stream of water from the garden hose. This will blast aphids away, as will my “remedy for all”: one gallon of water mixed with one tablespoon of Sunlight dish soap and applied to the areas of the plants hosting aphids.
There are still some chemical treatments available at garden centres and hardware stores but remember, they are poisonous not only to ants but to pets, birds and humans as well. If prefer an organic method of pest control, then you can choose one of the methods below:
- Ants make hills with the excess dirt removed from their burrows that house the colony. Boiling water is an extremely effective way to rid your lawn of the ants. Take a pail that is large enough to cover the top of the anthill and place it upside down, over the main hole of the burrow on the top of the anthill. Heat another pail of water (preferably about 5 gallons) to boiling and then pour into the soil surrounding the anthill, flooding the hill, but saving enough water to mostly fill the pail covering the anthill. The ants will seek refuge in the dry confines of the overturned pail and once the pail is full of the colony you can overturn the pail and fill it with the boiling water, killing all of the ants inside. You may have to repeat this a few times for really large hills.
- Ants are repelled by certain aromatic herbs and plants. You can plant these directly in your gardens to keep ants at bay and then distribute leaves from the plant in areas where you see ants. Mint family (all plants), lavender, chives, garlic, tansy and onions.
- A mixture of hot pepper flakes whirled in the blender, with water, to make a thin paste and poured on the hill or on the soil where ants congregate is a very effective method. As is a mixture or water and fresh orange peels whirled in the blender to make a thin paste. Make sure to replenish after a heavy rain.
- “Cream of Wheat” sprinkled on the soil will be eaten by ants and then the wheat expands inside the ant, killing them.
- The old farmer’s remedy of using Borax (boric acid) mixed with sugar and a bit of water to form a thick paste is a very effective way to kill ants. You can spread the paste on a board or stone outside (protect from rain) or place in jar lids to use in the house. This is a poison so you may not want to use it if you have children or any pets that will get at the paste because of the sweetness of the sugar in the paste. They may think it is food.
- An alternative to the boric acid is to put drops of aromatic oils such as camphor, clove, lavender, spearmint, orange or grapefruit into jar lids and place them throughout the house. Replenish as the oil evaporates.
- Broken eggshells or a sprinkling of lime, bonemeal or powdered charcoal can be sprinkled on the soil as a barrier to ants. Make sure you use a continuous line or circle and replenish after heavy rains.
Use any of these suggestions to help you organically deal with your aggravation caused by ants and soon you’ll be ant free.
