Ant Protection

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SntaCruz83

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This year I've been having an issue with ants like never before. The house is clean, and there aren't any lines of ants going after food anywhere, but the scouts are driving me crazy. It seems as though in every room at any given time I can find one or two ants somewhere on a wall or ledge. Yesterday I heard some noise coming from one of my enclosures located on top of my entertainment center; I thought that maybe there was a hunt in progress but was shocked at my discovery. Ants had found some of my mantis' leftovers and they had come in full force to collect and the poor mantis was running circles trying to avoid them (opportunistic bastards).

I reached in, pulled him out and took the entire enclosure and threw it in the pool to drown the ants. Even with being aware of the ant scouts, I was surprised how quickly they had found and went after the leftovers because I clean out those enclosures at least once a day. My issue now is that I plan on being out of town from Wednesday to Sunday and I don't have anybody that could/would take care of my buddies while I'm gone.

Since they are only going to be alone for three full days (I leave Wed, come back Sun), I figured it'd be okay to just leave some extra food and moistened cotton balls in their enclosures while I'm gone. But, now I'm in need of some kind of ant barrier. So far these are my only ideas and I want to make sure I'm not overlooking something or endangering my mantises.

1.) Leave all mantises on same table that has been covered with baby powder.

2.) Draw chalk circles around each enclosure.

3.) Get some mesh fabric and wrap each enclosure up like an easter egg basket?

4.) Suspend them from the ceiling somehow?

Anyway, any and all suggestions are welcome and appreciated.

 
I read an article that ants will crawl away from cinnamon, mint, red chili powder, and black pepper. maybe put some of this next to window sills or holes you know they come from.

would suggest ant powder/poison, but that is to be done on the ant holes/under door etc but I think can be poisonous to your mantis if it finds its way there - although I never found anything else dead next to it when I used it.

 
Maybe set some sort of ant trap to attract them away from the mantids? Also, if you could use an attractant to purposely start a trail, you will be able to cut the trail with cayenne pepper and then track it back to the nest and then blast it with some RAID!

Good luck and have fun on your trip. I'm going to be going away for 3 days at the end of the month and am apprehensive about leaving them alone for the first time. They're so spoiled I might have an angry mob of mantids attack me when I get home.
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I also had some issues with ants.I really love this insect and I usually let them clean my kitchen.But last time they decided to eat some of my mantids.NOWAY!But I could not use insecticide or repelent because I think my other inverts would not like it.

So I decided to kill them one by one!!I thought of that queen ant counting her army at the end of the day and telling herself that it is not worth it!!! :p

Funny method?It worked for me,no more ants in my inverts room.But I had to stalk them for 2 weeks.

For a more serious method you can use pure lemon juice or basil plant.This last one works very well.

 
Thanks for the suggestions guys. The best bait that has worked for me is the stuff made by Terro. Since I will still need a backup method of protection/deterrent against the ants, I'll probably try a combination of the home remedies suggested and hope for the best. Thanks again!

 
What is attracting the ants? Get rid of that and you won't have an ant problem.

 
Rick said:
What is attracting the ants? Get rid of that and you won't have an ant problem.
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SntaCruz83 said:
This year I've been having an issue with ants like never before. The house is clean, and there aren't any lines of ants going after food anywhere, but the scouts are driving me crazy.
Click to expand...
Like I said, Rick, it's the ant scouts that are the potential problem. Since the initial incident there haven't been any ant lines anywhere in the house, but there is still the occasional opportunistic scout looking around and I'm trying to prevent another attack on my mantises while I'm gone. Because I'm planning on leaving them with food before I leave, it's inevitable that there will be some bug remains on the bottom of the mantis enclosures while I'm gone; this has potential to attract ants. This leads to the point of my original post, to find a way to keep the scouts from finding the feeder remains while I'm away. Unless there is a Litter Robot for Mantis enclosures, I can't just "get rid of" whatever is attracting the ants while I'm gone. I don't know if it's the summer heat that has driven them indoors in search of food or if a colony or two has migrated under the house but I'm not going to have time to go under the house to try a bug-bomb or two until I return.

 
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i had a pair of Hierodulas several years ago.. i lost the male to ants, and they were after leftovers too. Since that episode i've never left live food in with a mantis - i always feed them one-by-one, make sure they catch their prey, and then come back an hour later to pick up the pieces.

Then again, I've never had more than a handful of mantids at a given time, so most people might not have the time to do that...

The few times when I had to leave for a few days while keeping mantids, i left their tanks / containers in my mom's baking trays (each filled with around an inch of water). Household ants won't get past that..

 
OOoOO! A moat! I like it! I might go pick up a few of those aluminum pie pans. Thanks! =)

 
crucis said:
Glad to be of help! But dont forget to fill em with enough water in case they go dry while you're away :)
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They will have to be deep or they will dry out if gone for more than a few days. Since you say these are scout ants you may need to find how they are getting into your house in the first place. Treat outside the house and at the point of entrance. We get em in the kitchen sometimes and once I find how they're getting in I treat that spot and there will be no ants for awhile.

 
If your tanks are small you could set them on sticky (unbaited) traps at least while you are gone. Put paper or other under the tank itself, or it will be an adventure to clean.

I know the tarantula keepers have bigger problems with ants (going after eggs and slings). Maybe google whatever it is that they do?

 
I would think creating a band of vaseline around the outter lid of your enclosures would keep the ants from crawling in. I know it works with roaches and some other insects. I havent seen it tried with ants but dont know why it wouldnt work.

 

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