At least 21 new fire ant mounds popped up in the back yard in town since the last rain. This is getting ridiculous. Soon you won't be able to mosey around back there at all. I put some liquid stuff on them. It seemed to work, except for 2, which I might have missed. In case anyone is reading this who is not familiar with fire ants, this is from a Coyote Peterson episode, just to see what it feels like. He was supposed to hold his hands down there for 60 seconds, but only made it to 40: Btw, they are wrong about not popping the blisters. If you poke them with a needle, they stop itching immediately, heal much faster, and DO NOT leave scars. Just sayin'. This reminds me of the ant mounds in central Ohio at my grandpa's cabin. They were much larger than fire ant mounds. Or did it just seem that way because I was smaller? Had to look it up. Possibly the Allegheny Mound Ant? This is like what I remember. (File photo from south central Ohio)
Ugh, I hate fire ants. The best way to get them out of a large area is to use one of the broadcast pesticides, Nancy. At my brother's funeral recently I was seated in a folding chair right at the "seam" where they had placed those artificial turf-type outdoor rugs in the cemetery for the chairs to sit on. About halfway through the service I realized that fire ants were biting my foot. I had to restrain myself from jumping up and hopping around squealing.
You are tough, Beth. I would have had to excuse myself. Worst thing is to get them up your jeans, when you are not alone, and away from cover. I'm torn about using broadcast bait. Feel bad about killing all the nice sweet little ants. Some of them never bite at all.
I did kick my shoes off and brushed desperately at my feet and legs. One of the little buggers made it almost to my knee. So I had to sit there holding my feet up for what seemed like eternity. I know what you mean about the broadcast; I really don't like a lot of chemicals. We usually treat individual mounds in our yard, but all that seems to do is make them migrate to a different spot. My mother used the old "boiling water" thing which seemed to work but always killed the grass as well as the mound.
I recall reading somewhere, that cats do not necessarily like or want milk. Water is better for them with a balanced diet should do well.
Yes, it's not very good for them. I've had a couple of cats that really did like milk and seemed to tolerate it well. It was a last resort this time, or so I thought.
One of the things that I have read, that seems to help, is mixing sugar and borax powder and “feeding” it to the ants. Another method is to put grits (cereal) on top of the ant pile, and when they eat it , it expands and kill the ants. This seems bad, but is probably no worse than killing them with the boiling water, gasoline fumes, or pesticide would be. We only had small ant hills, but they were right by the garden, so I was always getting my feet bitten when I was our doing anything in that part of the garden. We didn’t have grits, but I used some of the Sevin Dust that Bobby had, and it stopped them right away, and only killed the ants in that area, so if you are going to use a pesticide, this seems to be a good one.
A scientist from Florida, Sanford Porter, has been experimenting for years with "decapitating flies" from South America, which have controlled the fire ants down there. They only attack fire ants, not other ants, or so he says. Found 2 more small mounds I missed last time. It is a mess mowing the lawn. If you hit an active mound the mower broadcasts the ants all over the place. But the neighbor's back yard is full of mounds. Seems hopeless.
Oh my gosh! I've never seen anything like that. I thought that I had enough insects and critters around here to worry about but I just feel for this guy or any other who has to deal with these, gosh!
Before burying the subject of fire ants... Small (4" across) inactive mound. Three seeds had been placed carefully on top, as if presented as a gift. Like a cat leaves a dead mouse on your porch. Later identified as persimmon seeds. There is no persimmon tree in my yard. Little things like this puzzle me.
(10/1/2020) Thursday The pine tree in the front yard finally fell down. I think it's been dead for 3 (?) years. Perfect timing. Just mowed the lawn, maybe for the last time this year. Only about 8 feet of trunk is still standing. I'll wait until that part can be pushed over. Might clean the rest up tomorrow. I like jobs like this. You know when you are finished and it doesn't balloon into something bigger.
(10/5/2020) Monday The top half was like paper. The bottom half was very hard at the center. Rolled the bottom half off the grass. In 3 more years it will be just a stick down the center. Stump is closer to 12 feet high. It takes up less space remaining vertical. I suppose that would bother some people. Several limbs were impaled in the ground. I learned you can get them out by prying them out like you do splinters from your hands. ps. Didn't see the hummingbirds. If they left, they picked great weather from this end.
Last week I drove the cart over the rest of the cleared area under the power lines. They stopped at the last pole, about 30 yards from the cabin. I tried to take a video of the trip while driving. It turned out pretty bad, although I've seen worse on YouTube. The problems The cart bounces so much you can't keep the camera steady. I can't keep it focused at the right place for various reasons. And you really need both hands to drive in some places. All that, and watch the road at the same time, is too much multitasking for me. This winter The hummingbirds have gone, there is no mowing to do now. Only some fence repair, which isn't as important as it was with goats vs dogs. I will try to find someone to repair it. It's too big a job for one inexperienced person. But I still need to show up out there occasionally. It's very possible enough things will go wrong that the whole winter will be spent just trying to do repairs and keep the perimeter fence clear. But just in case, it would be nice to have an ongoing project you could drop and pick up at any time. All this got me thinking... There are several old roads around the interior of the place which we quit using and let grow up. Most of them could be cleared again. Extra motivation might be to record them on video just for fun and to keep a record. But the video problems need to be solved first. Some of these problems could be corrected by just driving slower, but I can't stand to go slow, and that would make the videos even longer.