How to get rid of ants in the house

Ants just come and go. It seems it has more to do with the weather than anything you try to do.

I had my bathroom wall COVERED in ants. No idea why. It was cold at the time so maybe the cold made them come in?

But seriously for any pests chemicals only do so much. It’s like laying out traps for rats. They still come despite the trap and they’re smart enough to not go near the trap. But when I bring a cat into the house, the rats are smart enough to not come in. Those who comes in, well gets natural selection.

I’ve found that stuff to be pretty good actually, and cheap - I think it’s just a solution of borax/boric acid and sugar, so not too different from what people were talking about above. The ants in our apartment definitely like it anyway (but it does take a few days to work and noticeably reduce the number of ants).

I did buy some boric acid recently to make my own by mixing it with sugar or something, but didn’t get around to doing it yet. I read somewhere that different types of ants have different tolerances to how much boric acid you can include before they won’t eat it anymore.

Founds ants on top of a single stack of boxes in the middle of a room. No one spends time in this room. A few bookshelves, a desk. But room is basically storage. There is never food or plants of any type in this room.

Accidently left a piece of bread on top of the box a couple days ago when looking for something.

Ants then all over the top of the box.

There is no source of food in any room near the room.

Can’t figure out where they came from. Or where they are or went to now.

Out in the countryside we get these very, very small ants which can enter from anywhere. They are so small I imagine a few grains of anything is enough to make them want to keep coming inside.

Last time they came in from the electrical outlet which is amazing.

Tried all sorts of poison stuff. Ended up just spending lots of time killing their long lines of workers till they just kinda gave up. I did one time spotted they entering from outside so could spray them coming up the wall of the house.

Boric acid, as mentioned. You need to.mic it with food. Many ants have a sugar and protein craving, make 2 different baits with biric acid added. Safe, easy and effective. Kills the nest and queen, not just he workers.

Google it. Been using this nethid for 20 years in a few countreis and always has worked wonders. From fire ants here (sugar bases uusally are good enough) to carpenter ants in rotting houses in Canada (protein bases are better).

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Life tip: you are never more than a few feet away from ants or spiders at any time in your life.

I’m surprised no one has mentioned cinnamon. Ants hate cinnamon. Get a giant thing of it from Costco and sprinkle on top of their path. Clean it up after a few days, once you know the food they were attracted to is no longer there. I’ve even sprinkled cinnamon in a piece of tape and stuck the tape on the hole. They stopped coming in pronto. Obviously this only works if you know where they’re coming from. As far as “non toxic” goes, unless you or your pets are doing the cinnamon challenge, it’s * probably * safe

Edit: Also, be careful when spraying chemicals on ants, as they evolve quickly. When I was little, my mom would spray ants in the kitchen with 409 (an American chemical cleaner) and they would drop dead instantly. By the time I was in high school, 409 did nothing to them and they had developed such a strong shell that you could hear it cracking when you squished it. And you had to really grind them dead, like a tick. And yes, I’m sure they were ants. We’re pretty sure a colony is completely surrounding my parents house.

The product shown above and available from supermarkets here is fucking magic. I had ants everywhere. They’re now gone. So gone I almost miss them.

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I really hate ants.

My apartment seemed to have a bunch lurking around earlier this year. Turns out, they’d made a nest in my potted plants.

Tossed them out and they seem to have all gone.

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That happens.

Terro ant bait is amazing. Used it about 3 years ago and haven’t had ants since. Only problem is it’s hard to get in Taiwan.

The issue is the same. You put something to deter them from going in a line, they just move their line elsewhere. They will come back. Unless one wants to avoid killing animals, which i respect, you need to kill the queen and the nest from inside to prevent them from fleeig and starting new colonies, not just disrupt one of their freeways. like chess, kill the king, not the pawns. Cinnamon, alcohol, raid, garlic, chili and so on wont solve the problem, only temporarily move it as well as cause more garbage to clean up later.

This may be obvious to some but where do you find boric acid?

Pharmacies usually have it. 20 to 50 dollars and it will last you a few years with constant onslaught. A little bit goes goes a long way as it is brought back to the colony and eaten, killing from within.

Remember to mix it with a food ants like in order to make a bait. Even the laziest of baits with sugar water laced with boric acid works amazingly well in a bottle cap placed somewhere along their lines of forage.

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Carrefor sells the commercial product pictured above. Which is really just boric acid. Seek out the bug killer section.

Works really well.

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I bought this insect repellent at Shopee a week ago (not sure if you can buy it anywhere else) and after using it a few days ago, it has proven quite effective so far. The ants hasn’t returned back to the spot I usually place my garbage bag.

A bit of warning thou, It has a bit of fertilizing smell after the spray but quite tolerable. I wasn’t expecting it to smell like roses.

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Do you mean this product or the box that was posted a few posts later?

Ants haven’t been a big enough problem to do that much with but…they are everywhere. I believe they are simply searching for food because I have a random ant on my desk then an ant on my computer then an ant on my wall. If I leave a bit of food out, it’s covered inside of an hour but I don’t see that many outside of that.

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Yeah that’s the one. Get on it. They start to get really annoying after a while.

It is the same, they just made the bait for you. My issue with these products is that the world is objecticely facing a massive waste/pollution problem. These premade traps are simply putting a tiny bit of bait inside the plastic structure, often inside a bag, then in a box. Then think about the factory energy used to blend, squirt, mold and pack all these things.

I personally feel quite strongly that we as people need to take the bare minimum of effort to stop causing such massive amounts of completely unnecessary waste. As an example, a 100g bag of boric acid is in a single ziplock bag. Some brands are also then put into a box, but i choose not to buy those for that reason. We are only killin ants after all… 2kg of sugar to mix: another bag (maybe 2 if you can only find 1kg bags) and some tap water. You can even use left over super sweet things an avoid the sugar if you like, avoid even more waste. we often have used leftbover cooking.oils from.meat for tge protein traps and left over fruits in season (pineapple, mango, cherimoya etc…sweet fruits) for the sweet traps. Free and also easy, but need to.make it paste/liquid…blender or juice frkn fruits. Anyway. Thats enough to make easily 5,000 of those store bought traps. Now do the math on how much plastic and boxes are used for5,000.

Its not about money savings (although it is obviously next to free on a per trap basis) its about firstly effectiveness (home made is WAY better as recipe ratios can be adjusted per species like ants vs cockroach) and secondly , there is a HUGE reduction in pollution caused by making those dinky little plastic traps.

I think for this precise issue, it isnt more inconvenient to make your own as its so easy. so the convenience excyse does not apply. As easy as opening the box and reading the instructions of the premade ones. So there is little excuse once we know better.

My last bag of boric acid is 4 years old…only bought it cause i couldnt find my previous bag. thats how long it lasts. I have bought 3 total my ENTIRE life in taiwan haha…very efficient . And i have lived in some messed up wild houses here with huge infestations.

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Thats thvpollution shit im talking about. All that plastic, ink and paper has caused pollution somewhere without good justification.

You seeing a couple ants isnt really a problem. They are scouting for food. Traps are hard here because that single ant may miss it. Butbyou can still plaxe it where it can find it. Obviously walls are tricky, floors and flat places are best (gravity) In this situation, i strongly suggest sugar based traps as they swarm faster towards carbs than protein usually (all us that hate taiwanese sugar filled breads can attest to this very easy, fool proof experiment haha). Place about 10 pinheads of boric acid and 10x that of sugar into a bottle cap or something similar and fill with water and mix. when it dries out, top up with water and mix it back in.

As always, this is killing the cause (entire colony including its reproductive sector), not the symptoms (scouts). So it takes a few days to a week to work through the entire colony. Its effective, and the best way currently available short of fumigating the entire area…which is always bad with few benefits. For instant gratification, finger, press, smear. No need for sprays.

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Carrefor sells the commercial product pictured above. Which is really just boric acid. Seek out the bug killer section.

Works really well.