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Order Your "Field Guide to Structure Infesting Ants" Now. |
White-Footed Ants
Size: About 1/8-inch long. Color: Black with pale tarsal segments at the end of all six legs, giving it its name. The White-footed ant is a serious pest in southern Florida. These ants nest outdoors under items on the ground, within landscape mulch, beneath loose bark on trees, under ground cover, in potted plants, and within piles of items, such as lumber, firewood, or bricks. Nests may also be readily established inside homes in walls, beneath carpeting, and in other suitable voids or spaces. White-footed ants may develop huge colonies containing thousands of workers and numerous queens. A colony of white-footed ants can number up to one million individuals. This species may be difficult to control and does not feed much on ant baits. The keys to control are to find the colonies and subcolonies and treat them directly. Regular inspections and service are necessary to find and treat new colonies as they move from neighboring properties. The white-footed ant may well be the most difficult to control of all structure-infesting ants. In many situations elimination of ant activity is nearly impossible, especially during mid-summer in areas where this ant occurs. At best, regular treatments hold the ants at bay, keeping as few ants as possible from entering the home or business. Without such efforts, however, the numbers of ants seen inside can rise into the thousands. Regular pest control treatments can help minimize the numbers of ants seen inside. It is especially important to seal as many cracks in the homes exterior as possible to exclude ants and other pests.
Note: Ant baits are not very effective for these ants because of the fact that worker ants do not exchange food directly with queens or larvae. Most ants offer food they have gathered to the larvae, which digest the food and regurgitate it back to the adult workers. If the food was a poison bait, the workers would ingest it and be killed. However, the White Footed Ant has a group of workers that lay sterile eggs, and it is these eggs that are consumed by many adult ants in the colony as well as the larvae. Thus, they might avoid ant baits that we may use. However, John Warner, a graduate research assistant with University of Florida's Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, has developed a new bait that seems to be attractive to white footed ants. We will keep you abreast of any new developments. Regular inspections and service are necessary to find and treat new colonies as they move in from neighboring properties. Be sure to check underneath items lying on the ground as well as under mulch and rock areas. Check neighboring fence/wall lines to see if ants are coming in from neighboring properties. These perimeter treatments can keep your home or business pest free. We suggest a regular treatment on the exterior with Demand, Tempo, or Suspend. For added control use Talstar G. General tips for limiting ant infestations include:
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