Fire ants are not just annoying critters that can be found in any ordinary backyard, however, they can be a real threat. If you accidentally tripped over their mound, you will certainly call out to the highest heavens because the painful sting they inflicted on you can last for up to several excruciating weeks. And not only that, the stung area will also leave you a marker, a scar reminding you how brutal these ant species can be. Due to this reason, a pest control company offering serious fire ant extermination in Waterloo is needed.
If you will ask out any gardener in Canada, they will vouch for you that there really is no scarcity of control methods for fire ants. It is just that this ant species is so savage and yet there are only a few effective methods that you can employ to destroy them. If this should be the case, the looming question on the horizon now is, should we resort to the use of pesticides which may contain noxious components? My quick and sure answer is NO. There are a plenty of non-toxic methods that you can try on your own if you want to go the DIY approach first. Bucketing This strategy is among the simplest to do if you are just going to deal with 1 or 2 colonies of fire ants. In this method, you will just need to dig up the mound at about a foot or so and then dump everything into just one or maybe two buckets. But before you even start I suggest that you sprinkle a significant amount of baby powder or some cornstarch so as to prevent the ants from climbing off the shovel and the bucket. I also want to suggest that you tuck your pants into your socks, this way you will immediately see if there are any fire ants getting their way to you. For best results, try working this strategy out on a daytime when most of the fire ants are on the mound. If you caught this up in spring, the best time for you to do this is during mid - late morning. If you are planning to try this technique instead of on a summer, it would be best to do it early in the morning. The moment that you have shoveled a big part of the mound into a large bucket, you can start pouring water mixed with generous amounts of liquid detergent solution. This would help drown the fire ants that you have put into the bucket container from the mound. Try to achieve the consistency of a puddle mud to maximize the results. Normally, fire ants will get drowned from this solution overnight. The purpose of the soap or detergent solution here is to break the surface tension, hence, fire ants will drown as they will have no way of breathing through it. The summer heat will make the fire ants drown faster as compared to doing it on an early spring morning, which takes some time for them to drown. As much as possible try not to fill your bucket more than three-quarters of mound and ants, to allow an amount of space for water when you fill it in. Hot Water Some people will have a hard time with the bucketing method because not many people can shovel the mounds of earth into a bucket. But don’t worry because there is a better alternative to this. Instead of using detergent solution to inundate the collected mound and ants on your bucket, you can make use of hot water as a substitute. Nothing can be more effective in killing fire ants than the use of hot water, as a matter of fact, this method is also environment-friendly because it won’t have any harsh impact to the environment. However, have patience when using hot water treatment instead because you may have to have 3-4 to pourings in your bucket in order to completely scald the contained ants. This will lead to best results.The water you will be using for this strategy need not be necessarily boiling water but really hot enough to scald the fire ants. Be very careful though and take extra caution when trying this technique to avoid accidental water spills. Hot water spills may cause you to have severe skin burns, and you don’t want that to happen to you. Diatomaceous Earth With this type of ant extermination strategy, it will make use of silica which is supposed to scratch the ant’s cuticle so as to cause it to become dehydrated and it will die. You may take a colony of fire ants in a bag, shake them up in diatomaceous earth and certainly, you will find that half of them will die in no time. However, if you try to use this technique on fire ants outside the bag, they will try to avoid it and thus find a way to escape, too. Hence, there would be fewer numbers of exterminated fire ants eventually. Steam Injectors Not many people know that there exist today machinery that can be used as steam injectors. The steam being produced by these machines are lethal to insects including fire ants. As a matter of fact, they are being used today in most farms populated by fire ants. Church grounds and open spaces that are near residential communities are also taking advantage of this technology to help them address their pest infestation problems including fire ants. However, there is one drawback of this technique if you are not going to take caution when employing it. It may cause serious damage to your shrubbery and plants. Therefore, you need to have calculated action so that your grass and shrubbery will not get caught in the way of it. These are just some of the high impacting DIY techniques you can try in the absence of professional pest control firm. But you may also come across a number of strategies that I suggest you dare not try anymore because they are not going to yield any positive results. It will just lead to frustration because they will not meet your expectations. Here are some of them just so you know why. Mixing Colonies This type of DIY approach is ineffective. The idea behind this approach is that by mixing together at least two colonies, the worker ants from these two groups will engage in a deadly fight against each other. It is hoped that the battle will eventually lead to wiping out at least one of the colonies. However, you can’t expect it to be so. While the worker ants from two opposing ant groups will indeed fight each other, it is very seldom that it will lead to the annihilation of one colony. Straw Itch Mites There are a number of controlled studies that seem to indicate that there could be moderate benefits if you will release straw itch mites on a fire ant colony. But there are a few studies that show none at all. Household Cleaning Products I believe that most of the household cleaning products that we will attempt to use for this purpose will yield no positive results at all. Instead of exterminating fire ants, these regular cleaning products that we are under the impression of being exterminating them will just act as a repellant. Hence, it will cause these fire ants to dispel instead and scatter. Usually, this will lead them to build another nest instead. In a way, you are just causing the problem and their ant population to spread even more. Sonic Vibrators In all honesty, I have not come across one device of this nature that actually works. The last time that I tried out a product of this type, fire ants started to move in again after a month. The weather then was already cold, while I observed that the vibrating rod was actually warm, working and nice. Exhaust Fumes Some people may even suggest to you to at least try a more radical approach to eradicating fire ants in your property. One of which is to make use of exhaust fumes from your car engine or lawn mower, pumping them into the fire ant mounds. I tried this technique myself some time ago. At first, I was in awe that it did actually work, the ants that climbed out of the mound due to exhaust fumes being pumped into their mound were motionless as if dead. Anyone who would witness that would be under the impression that the fumes killed the fire ants, however, after about 30-45 minutes the motionless fire ants suddenly moved and thus in no time they were back to being active again. It is as if nothing happened. Therefore, I concluded that exhaust fumes will not cause any serious damage to fire ants except that it will just cause them to become inactive for a short period of time. I completely understand how difficult your situation is when you are faced with a fire ant infestation problem, where your kids and anyone in your household could be at risk of being stung by them at any given chance. It may require you to have a good amount of patience when trying to find a reputable pest control firm offering ant extermination in Waterloo. A good research skill is necessary for this purpose.
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