Anyone got a good way to get rid of fire ants? HELP?

HELP My yard is infested with fire ants and it has become a major problem since my riding mower broke and I have been trying to push mow my yard. I counted 25 fire ant bites on my feet from attempting to mow less than a quarter of my yard. I promptly fired Terminix at that point.

Terminix refuses to do anything about this but keep them out of my house and for what they charge I am betting I can do better. Any ideas? Asked by iamhobbit 57 months ago Similar Questions: rid fire ants HELP Recent Questions About: rid fire ants HELP Home > Patio, Lawn & Garden.

Similar Questions: rid fire ants HELP Recent Questions About: rid fire ants HELP.

Family Solution and internet solution. We always did what we called drown and dig. Basically - boil some water.. pour it onto the mound.. and then dig it out.

Fill a 5 gallon bucket with hot hot hot water... pour it on the mound... then dig it out. It is grimey dirty work and can get you stung a bit.. but if you do it right - they're done. If you want to avoid getting bitten... - take a could of trash bags and wrap your feet with them and tape them off around the knee.

Once you're done.. just hose your legs off. There may be other products but it's always worked best for me... ALSO! Were I to encounter this problem now... I'd ask my lawn service to handle it.

Those guys see this stuff all the time and probably know the fastest easiest way.. or keep chemicals on hand that won't hurt your lawn. So - hiring a lawn service for a couple of months may be worth while.. and be less than terminix... and here's what the internet has to say: A scientist evaluates the many ways gardeners try to get rid of nasty fire ants and names the most effective. Related Articles > Identifying Insect Pests And Beneficials > Control Insects Without Pesticides Products > Insect, Disease and Weed I.D. Guide Discussions > New Gardeners Fire ants are no mere annoyance—as anyone who has accidentally stepped on one of their mounds will tell you, a fire ant's sting can be painful for weeks.

Gardeners who have tried to eliminate fire ant colonies know there is no shortage of advice on how to get to rid of the mounds, but few truly effective methods. But does that mean you need to turn to a toxic solution? No, says Dr. Sanford Porter, a researcher at the USDA-ARS Center for Medical, Agricultural and Veterinary Entomology in Gainesville, Florida, who has studied fire ants for more than a decade.

Here is Dr. Porter's assessment of the many nontoxic methods gardeners' try to get rid of fire ants. Bucketing fire ant colonies This is one of the simplest ways of dealing with one or two problem colonies. Basically, the procedure is to rapidly dig the mound and a foot or so of soil under the mound and dump it into one or several large buckets.

Sprinkling the bucket and shovel with baby powder or cornstarch before you starts keeps the ants from climbing out of them. Remember to tuck your pants into your socks to keep the ants where you can see them. Dig up the soil at a time of day when most of the colony is in the mound.

In the spring, the best time is usually mid- to late morning. In the summer, it might be early morning. Once the ants are in the bucket, you can choose to drown the ants or simply to carry them to some place where they are not a problem.

If you choose to drown the ants, add a generous squirt of dish soap, water from a hose, and stir to mix the soap throughout the mud in the bucket. The soap breaks the surface tension and drowns the ants much more quickly. It usually takes overnight to kill the ants.

In the heat of the summer, they will probably drown faster, but on cool days in the spring, it may take longer. It is best not to fill the buckets more than three-quarters full of ants and dirt so there is room to add the water. Hot water Pouring hot water on the mounds is effective and environmentally friendly, but may require 3 or 4 applications to kill the colony.

Water should be at least scalding hot, but does not need to be boiling. This works best when you use 3 to 4 gallons of water in each application. WARNING: Hot water kills grass and shrubbery and may cause severe burns if spilled.

Corn grits Ineffective. The theory is that the fire ants will eat the dry corn grits, drink some water, and then die as the corn grits expand inside them. The image of greedy little ants exploding like popcorn inside their mounds is very compelling.

The problem is that fire ant workers only drink liquids; they are incapable of ingesting solids. Fire ant larvae will eat solid food, but they chew it up and mix it with saliva just like we do before they swallow it. Grits simply don't work, so any perceived effects are due to mound disturbance and colony movement.

(Don't look so skeptical—it's true! ) Dry Rice Ineffective. See corn grits above.

Diatomaceous earth Little crystals of silica are supposed to scratch the ant's cuticle so they dehydrate and die. Indeed, if you take a colony of ants and shake them up in bag with diatomaceous earth, about half die. But when you use it on ants outside they usually find ways to avoid it so not many ants are killed.

They will not eat it in food and foraging ants do not track it into colonies where it might kill the queen or young fire ants. Mixing different colonies together The idea is that workers from the two colonies fight until they kill each other. Workers from two single-queen colonies will fight if they are mixed, but it will rarely result in both or even one colony being killed.

However, if you mix fire ant colonies together with multiple-queens in them, it only makes for a bigger party. Straw itch mites Some studies have shown moderate benefits from releasing these beneficial mites, but other studies have found none. However, the most dramatic effect has been the large rashes that researchers have gotten from some of the stray mites that they were releasing.

Ooh, itchy, itchy, ITCHY! Two wooden blocks As in "place ant on middle of Block A and then rapidly apply Block B. " Very effective on an ant by ant basis, but a lot of work for a colony with a quarter million workers!

Gasoline DO NOT USE IT! It is expensive and dangerous to the environment and to your health to pour gasoline onto the mounds. Extensive or frequent use can threaten the purity of your ground water.

Igniting the gasoline intentionally or accidentally does nothing to improve its effectiveness, but it can pose a serious threat to your health and property. Household cleaning products Most don't work at all. Some act as a repellent, causing the colony to build new mound a few feet away.

Anything that does work is likely to be expensive and bad for you, your yard, and the environment. Exhaust fumes Exhaust fumes from a car or riding lawn mower can be pumped into fire ant mounds. About 12 years ago, I tried it with my old VW Superbeetle.

After about 15 minutes the result was that most of the ants were motionless, but 30 minutes later, they woke up and went back to work. Maybe 30 to 40 minutes of exhaust fumes would be effective, but that is a long time and I hear that plugging up the exhaust systems of gasoline engines can be pretty hard on them. (Fortunately, my VW still worked, but so did the ants.

) Mechanical Devices Mechanical devices that cut, chop, stir, mix, pound, or grind up fire ants in their mound can be effective during times of the year when most of the colony is up in their mound. The benefit of these devices is that they leave no chemical residue. The problem with them is that they are usually expensive to purchase, labor intensive to use, and inefficient in dealing with colonies under rocks, roads, sidewalks, or shrubbery.

Steam injectors These can be effective, but like hot water they will kill grass and shrubbery. Also see comments about mechanical devices. Sonic Vibrators I don't know of any that work.

With the one I tested, fire ants moved in and built a mound around it after about a month when the weather turned cold and the vibrating rod was nice and warm. Electric bug zapper grids These dramatically kill ants that run across them—the problem is that all fire ants are not like lemmings. A large majority of the colony runs the other way while only a few stay and "fight" the zapper.

Microwaves Might work, but I would be awfully nervous around a microwave oven big enough to rapidly heat the ground up to 3 to 4 feet deep! Giant anteaters Contrary to what their name implies, giant ant eaters in South America do not eat ants. They eat termites.

Besides who would want a 200 pound animal with claws and arms as strong as a bear wandering through their neighborhood! Our little native ant eater, the armadillo can be enough of a problem. Modest Proposals for Eradication As in "Pay me $1 per queen and 1 cent per ant and I will solve your fire ant problem.

" Nice proposal, but with up to a quarter million ants per mound and mound densities of well over 100 mounds per acre, this could easily cost $25,000 per acre per year—a pretty good business deal if you can get it! Additional information about fire ant control and lots of other good fire ant facts can be found at the following websites: Sources: http://www.organicgardening.com/feature/0,7518,s1-2-9-119,00.html .

Diatomaceous Earth will kill them I have had to use this answer quite a bit lately. (smile)Ants are a problem everywhere this year. Diatomaceous Earth is just great for ants and many other things too.

It is not poison either. You can learn more about it here. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diatomaceous_earth... has it herehttp://amazon.com/GreenSense-Diatomaceous-Earth... the powder everywhere the ants are and poof!

They will die forever! You can as well purchase it at garden shopsHave a wonderful ant free day Sources: my knowledge .

I have tried everything and the fire ant stuff dosent work their immiune help 6 days ago - 1 hour left for voting - 10 answers - Report Abuse This question is no longer open for answering. Here's your chance to cast a vote if you haven't already. Add/Save Add to private Watchlist Save to My Web Add to Del.icio.us Add to My Yahoo!

RSS Show who starred AnswersShow: All answersOldest to newestNewest to oldestRated highest to lowestTotal rating 0 or higherTotal rating higher than -2Total rating higher than -5Answer hidden due to its low rating Hide User Question/Answer Information Answerer 1 Fight fire with Fire. Torch there little butts! 6 days ago - Report Abuse .

1 sepllcehck, regarding your answer "Family Solution and internet solution. ":You don't know how much I appreciate this. I will definitely try it.

Sepllcehck, regarding your answer "Family Solution and internet solution. ":You don't know how much I appreciate this. I will definitely try it.

2 glad to help... one of my worst bike wrecks (yes I wrecked a lot) I fell about 10 feet right into a fireant bed...I was just laying there - doing the whole -toe wiggle personal inventory "what's injured" check... and felt the tingling (actually ants crawling all over me. ) needless to say.. at some point they decided to all start biting at once....I was buck naked within seconds screaming aat the top of my lungs running around like I was on fire shaking my clothes franticalyl.. Luckily.. I wasn't too hurt/allergic/arrested but boy did they get me moving... I think I actually got a endorphine rush from being bit so much so fast....I hate fire ants... they can all F-ing die for all I care...

Glad to help... one of my worst bike wrecks (yes I wrecked a lot) I fell about 10 feet right into a fireant bed...I was just laying there - doing the whole -toe wiggle personal inventory "what's injured" check... and felt the tingling (actually ants crawling all over me. ) needless to say.. at some point they decided to all start biting at once....I was buck naked within seconds screaming aat the top of my lungs running around like I was on fire shaking my clothes franticalyl.. Luckily.. I wasn't too hurt/allergic/arrested but boy did they get me moving... I think I actually got a endorphine rush from being bit so much so fast....I hate fire ants... they can all F-ing die for all I care...

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Out in my garden today, I saw a trillion bazillion ants and egg sacs under some rocks surrounding my garden. Help!

I,ve tried the powder, even sunk my root feeder in to the.

Need help just laid new lawn a few weeks ago only to find holes every where caused by infestation of red ants.

How to get rid of red ants destroying the lawn.

I have these tiny little ants in my kitchen that I never had before. How do I get rid of them?

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.