Troubles, inconveniences bring us ants not only at home. How to get rid of ants in the garden? For gardeners, gardeners, perhaps this is one of the most important issues. Even at the end of the question they add the word - get rid forever. That's how tired! Garden black ants, this is perhaps the second big garden nuisance after weeds. As you know, forest ants are our friends. And we are aggressive towards gardening, because they spread and breed aphids, the most dangerous garden pest. Each of us wants to learn some simple, effective recipe from ants in the garden and how to deal with them.
But, unfortunately, there is no universal recipe; there is a complex of tools and methods that will help to reduce their number to a minimum, to lead them away from those garden gardens where their presence is undesirable.
How useful are ants in the garden and garden, is it worth it to get rid of
Yes, there is a benefit. Soil scientists note that the soil where garden ants live is 2 times richer in potassium and more than 10 times richer in phosphorus. It is this form of phosphorus and potassium that is best absorbed by plants.
In addition, ants feed on caterpillars, larvae of flies, spider mites and other pests. This is also important.
Anthills contain soil in a loose state, which increases its fertility.
Ants carry plant seeds for miles. The seeds of thyme, celandine, sprouts, violets and many others are covered with an appetizing composition for ants. Attracting them with their own taste, they "travel" on black riders from one section to another.
In addition, the ants themselves are food for birds. Thus, they attract to us feathered garden defenders.
How ants harm our sites
Yes, and they also bring harm.
It is noticed that where the ants settled, the acidity of the soil increases. And this means that not all plants can actively grow and multiply there.
Sometimes ants choose uncomfortable places for us to build anthills. Many gardeners claim that in this case, the growth of bushes, for example, strawberries is inhibited. Often the bushes simply die. Although this is a moot point. I will explain below. why I do not consider ants the cause of death of strawberry bushes.
Many probably saw a lot of ants and wasps on the peony buds. The fact is that future flower leaves evolve to produce sweet juice. Eating them ants can bite the leaves, thereby causing increased secretion of tasty juice, and sometimes causing an irreparable appearance of the flower.
Remember that above I, as a benefit from ants, noted their ability to carry seeds? So this can be considered as harm. After all, ants carry weed seeds as well. They noticed that sometimes you wonder how the celandine got to the place where it had never grown before.
Well, the biggest harm that ants do to our garden and garden is the spread of aphids. Saw aphids, note that you must have noticed ants on a particular plant before. First ants appeared, and then aphids.
Ants in the garden and garden, features of existence
Indeed, we regard black garden ants as pests of a garden. They do not build tall anthills. Their habitat can be seen by small holes in the ground.
In the summer, these insects begin to feed on the sweet aphid secretions. Together with aphids, they form certain communities. A black garden ant protects aphids from various enemies. And she has a lot of enemies. Starting from ladybugs, ending with small birds, which are also not averse to feast on aphids.Of course, the ants will not drive the bird away, but they can do with the ladybug. If you are lucky, you can see how together they will squeeze out a ladybug from a twig covered with aphids.
In our gardens, greenhouses, ants and aphids are usually inseparable. Recently, aphids are very much like weeds, cultivated plants, too. Aphids suck juice from leaves, stems of plants, thereby causing great harm to the future crop, and it secrets sweet milk that attracts ants. There are ants where there are many aphids.
Of course, the gardener receives the main damage from aphids. But the ants carry aphids, their eggs in garden plants, drive away from the aphids those predatory insects that feed on the aphids themselves. Therefore, if nothing is done, aphids will breed rapidly. And goosebumps just need this - “pastures” are increasing, they are not threatened by hunger.
If you decide to fight ants, then it will be impossible to do without paying attention to aphids, depriving gooseflesh of food supply. I warn you right away that it is neither possible nor necessary to completely defeat the black garden residents. But to reduce their number, in parallel to reduce the risk of damage to our plant aphids - we can do it.
There are many ways to do this.
How to poison ants in the garden, preparations, methods and means
Chemicals and remedies for garden ants
There are chemicals that help to remove ants, for example, Muratsid, Anteater, Delicia powder, from which aqueous solutions are prepared, they are watered by the places of accumulation of insects. Pasty House Cleaner, The Great Warrior, others spread the paste-like products on top of cardboards, boards, lay them out where they saw the largest gathering of goosebumps.
There are various sticky paper or plastic traps for them. These methods are quite effective, but have a not very long validity. After 2-3 weeks they decompose. And annoying insects can appear there again.
Any gardener should understand that ants are an indicator of the presence of aphids on plants. They will leave their favorite places when there are no aphids. And no food - nothing to eat. Therefore, they are advised to simultaneously use drugs against aphids - Bison, Confidor-Extra, Decis-Profi, Tanrek, Biotlin, Alatar, BI-58, and others. But a solution of these drugs, falling on leaves with aphid secretions, makes them poisonous also for ants. Eating them, they die. If you regularly carry out such treatments, then there will be no aphids. But there will be no ants in these areas.
How to get rid of ants folk remedies, baits
There are many folk remedies. For example, pouring burrows, anthill moves with boiling water. The black garden ant does not really like ash or the smell of chopped tomato leaves. Of course, in such ways they cannot be completely defeated, but you can drive them away from some places.
There is another way, by the way, quite effective - pouring the habitats of these insects with urine or, as they say, the contents of a night pot. As a rule, after such "aromatic treatment" insects leave this place.
There are ways to destroy poisoned baits. These are more effective methods than those described above. You can prepare such bait yourself, but you should be very careful not to poison yourself.
I will tell you about some of the most effective.
To do this, we use boric acid, mix equal parts by volume with honey, or with jam, or with sugar, that is, with something sweet. I usually use a mixture of boric acid powder with sugar. I sprinkle with this mixture the places of the largest accumulation of insects. For me it is most often the tree trunk circles — especially they like to settle under pears. After a while, they disappear, I think, they just leave this place.
There is another unusual way to drive ants out of their area.Not so long ago I found out that if an ordinary dry millet or semolina is poured on top of an ant heap, then they leave this place. Sprinkle ordinary millet or semolina at the places where the insects gather. Why - I don’t know, but black pests are leaving. One tip: so that this millet or semolina is not glued by sparrows before it works, sprinkle some dried grass, straw or foliage on top of the sprinkled groats - this is not an obstacle for insects, and the birds will not notice.
If your site is very infected with goosebumps, it makes sense to use more powerful fighting methods. The goal of more powerful methods is the destruction of the "ant queen." While she is alive, working ants will be on site for sure. The "ant queen" lives underground - a depth of more than one and a half meters. Getting to her is difficult even with a shovel.
In our struggle with the “Queen of Ants” we are on two roads. The first - sweetened traps near each fruit tree or berry shrub made from sweet syrup or fermented beer - this is for working ants to reduce their number. The second - protective belts of adhesive tape, on top of which we apply a gel - poison bait. Her ants will carry inside the anthill, feed her their "queen".
One of the readers of my blog wrote: “This year the ants are inadequate - they ate about 20 bushes of strawberries, and the roots were eaten! I watched my strawberry for a week, not understanding what was happening to her - the leaves became salad-colored, curled up like an accordion. I dug up one bush, and there is a complete nightmare - the roots are sprinkled, inside them there are many ant eggs. What to do?"
Yes, garden insects can sometimes arrange not only anthills on strawberry beds, but even nests inside strawberry-strawberry bushes. Most often, this leads to the death of plants. But, most likely, the reader saw on the roots of wild strawberries not ant eggs, but the larvae of some kind of pest. It was he who damaged the roots. Not ants cause plant death. I repeat - ants are an indicator of the presence of a pest on a plant. You need to identify him and choose a way to deal with this pest.
But we, as always, are in a hurry, we need to quickly make some kind of decision. How to help strawberries in this case? To choose a remedy or method of assistance, one must take into account at what stage of development the plants are now. In order not to attack the ants and not to make them scapegoats, conduct activities that scare away the ants.
If your strawberry only blooms, then you can try to arrange the bait throughout the strawberry garden or meadow. Effective bait traps from ordinary baker's yeast mixed with a small amount of honey or sugar syrup (1 tbsp.spoon of dry yeast, 1 tbsp.spoon of sugar or honey). This is a disastrous treat for ants. To spread it between plants - it is better to take containers with small ones, for example, bottle caps, or spread small pieces of cardboard with this mixture.
And if green berries are already hanging on the strawberry bushes, then spray the plants with ammonia solution (1 tbsp.spoon per 8 liters of water - insist 20-30 minutes). Such a concentration will not harm the future crop, and goose bumps, they do not like such pungent odors.
Well, if your bed has ripe berries, then, of course, no spraying is acceptable. It can be advised to arrange branches of wormwood, mint, tansy, where they accumulate, in the garden. The ants will leave, they don’t like such smells. But do not forget to update repeller branches to more recent ones. Take more drastic measures against pests after harvesting.
The application of all these simple techniques together, as a complex, will help, if you do not get rid of the ants in the garden forever, then significantly reduce their number to the minimum that will not interfere with us in the garden.