Carpenter Ants
It is about this time of year that folks start seeing insects wandering around inside their houses. One or more of the more noticeable of these insects is the carpenter ant.
These chunky black ( sometimes red and black) ants can range from twenty five percent inch for worker ants up to three-quarters of an inch for the queen. Like all species of ants, carpenter ants have a constricted hourglass waist and elbowed antennae. These traits distinguish them from the thick-waisted termites with their straight antennae. Ants are intimately linked to bees, wasps, and sawflies.
Carpenter ants share with just one annoying habit with termites. They construct broad nests in wood, including logs, stumps, tree trunks, telephone poles, and, regrettably, buildings. Nests are usually begun in deteriorating timber that has been exposed to moisture. Often, the colony will extend its nest to adjacent, sound timber.
The colonies of carpenter ants are oftentimes long lived. A single fertilized queen founds each colony. She establishes a nesting site in a cavity in timber. She then rears her first brood of workers, giving them food to eat salivary secretions. She does not leave the nest nor feed herself throughout this period. The workers who are reared first assume the task of gathering food with which to feed the younger larvae. As the food supply becomes more constant, the colony population grows very rapidly. A colony does not reach maturity and become capable of producing young queens and males until it contains 2,000 or more workers. It could take a colony from 3 to 6 years or greater to reach this stage. Annually thereafter, the colony will continue to produce winged queens and males, which leave their nest and conduct mating flights in the spring and summer.
While termites actually eat and digest wood, carpenter ants simply chew and tunnel through it to build their homes. Carpenter ants rarely cause structural damage to buildings, although they can cause significant damage over a timescale of years because nests are so long lived. Damage by carpenter ants can leave household structural wood ready to accept fungus, rots, and several styles of decay. Some recent evidence suggests that they can likewise cause encompassing damage to foam insulating material. If faced with chewing through hard timber or soft insulation to constructor your nest, which would you prefer?
Finding carpenter ants indoors in the wintertime is an indication that they are nesting somewhere within the walls or floors of the building. This is owing to the truth that carpenter ants, like all insects, are cold blooded. Ants active in the winter has to be originating from a warmed source. Even if the air temperature outside is freezing cold, heat from the sunlight or your furnace or timber stove may warm your house walls and stir overwintering ants to activity. Ants located in the spring and summer are often invaders wandering in from outdoors looking for food or drink. In the spring, carpenter ants go through a mass-mating or swarming behavior. During this moment carpenter ants raid houses looking for sweets, because one of their normal sources of sugar, the sweet honeydew from aphids, is not accessible until the weather warms up.
The critical aspect in carpenter ant control is treating the nesting area. Locating the nest site is very seldom easy and there are times perhaps it is out of the question to locate the nest. The most likely sources of carpenter ants are window and door frames and sills, shower and tub enclosure walls, and kitchen and bath plumbing walls.
One or more of the goals of Integrated Pest Management and a good reason we encourage carpenter control by direct nest treatment is to limit the amount of pesticide applied. Oftentimes, we can find the ants to be of assistance to with the therapy.
Their zest for sweets can be their downfall. About the most efficient ways to control carpenter ants is to set out poison baits. Attracted to the sweet taste, the worker ants collect the bait and bring it back to the colony, where they share it with the developing larvae and the queen.
It may be important to be aware what sort of ant you are coping with since some ant species prefer different foods. Baits are formulated to work with certain species and will most likely specify which ones on the label.