Tuesday 27 February 2018

White Footed House Ants


White-Footed House Ants


What are white footed ants?

White-Footed house ants have become quite well in established in the Auckland region. They are one of the most common invaders of ants in homes and businesses in NZ. They got their name from the yellowish lower legs. Despite their small size of 3.0mm to 3.5mm long, they are a huge nuisance, especially when they are found throughout the kitchen pantry in large numbers!

Nesting

White-Footed house ants are found both indoors and outdoors. They enjoy nesting within walls, ceiling cavities and sub-floors. Here they are safe from the environmental factors like the rain and wind. One ant nest can have many queen ants and up to 2 million individuals!

A lot of our customers notice piles of dead ants, bits of wood and dust right under light fittings or window sills. Ants like to have a clean nest, so they will clear out any scraps and dead ants from their nest.

They don’t cause damage, however if they were to be nesting along power boxes it may cause short circuiting.


Diet/Do it yourself baiting

White-Footed house ants have a sweet-tooth. They enjoy a good meal of honey dew and nectar. They also love a good feast on ant bait you buy from the supermarket, or your local hardware store, as it is full of sugary goodness for them.

Do it yourself baiting can make the problem you have a whole lot worse! The ants that you see out and about are worker ants. This type of bait will usually only kill the ants that have taken the bait, not the colony. The ants unaffected by the bait realize something is going on and they may decide to relocate to avoid extermination. Or they may start laying more eggs to repopulate!

Treatment:
The best way to attack a nest is to do it slowly. Applying a treatment that is invisible to ants is the most effective way to wipe those little suckers out once and for all. The ants will walk through the treatment and tread it back to the nest to pass it on to the other workers and the queen. Slowly but surely this will exterminate the nest.