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RE: Ants terrorize children

Square Foot Gardening List - http://www.flinet.com/~gallus/sqft.html

Janet, I know this sounds strange, but here in Houston we use Johnson Baby
powder on the fire ants we use here.  They can't stand it.  Make sure it is
Johnson baby powder, however, and not a generic type.  I think it is the
perfume in the Johnson baby powder that they can't stand.  They do move
elsewhere, and as we have an organic garden, I can't "nuke" them with any
commercial poison.  Try it and let me know what happens, thanks, Richard

-----Original Message-----
From:	Janet Wintermute [j*@erols.com]
Sent:	Thursday, March 09, 2000 10:29 PM
To:	Square Foot Gardening List
Subject:	Re: Ants terrorize children

Square Foot Gardening List - http://www.flinet.com/~gallus/sqft.html

At 08:20 PM 3/9/00 -0500, Vasha wrote to us about her ant problems in
Alabama.

I presume you meant red imported fire ants (Solenopsis invicta) by the
description of "the biting kind".

It is *easy* to kill individual IFA's--boiling water will do it.  However,
if you don't kill the queen (and there's at least one in every mound), the
colony will simply whisk her off and start up a new mound elsewhere on your
property or the neighbor's lot.

These bugs are tricky.  They have sophisticated sensing behaviors and
protect the queen at all costs from any toxicant threats.  USDA research
recommends toxicant-laced bait products because the foraging IFA's bring
these materials back into the interior of the mound and that behavior gives
you a better shot at killing the queen.  Pouring an insecticide drench onto
a mound will kill zillions of individuals but very likely won't get the
queen.

Whatever method you select, be absolutely sure to follow label directions
to the nth degree.  It is a violation of U.S. federal law to apply
insecticides in any way other than according to the EPA-approved label on
the container.

I have edited some IFA publications, but I'm not sure if any have been
posted to the APHIS Website.  You can visit www.aphis.usda.gov and click on
Publications and then use the built-in search engine to see what's up for
public view.

Interestingly enough, IFA got into California for the first time only last
year.  The baddies hitchhiked inside bee shipping pallets that were being
sent into the state for pollination of crops.  Of course, the climate is
perfect for IFA's in California, so this is a bad situation.  I believe our
people worked cooperatively with the state to jump on this situation and
eradicate the IFA's as soon as we discovered they were onsite.

--Janet


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