How to get rid of carpenter ants effectively?

Ants are insects that fall into several species, but the two most commonly found in Canada are: the red carpenter and the black carpenter ant. These two species do not cause problems when spotted in the wild, they are often beneficial to trees because they eliminate harmful insects.
On the other hand, suspecting a massive presence of these creatures in your home is not good news, because they can harm your structures. It is therefore imperative that one knows how to get rid of carpenter ants, this article is a complete guide.
how to get rid of carpenter ants

Identify carpenter ants with the naked eye

As mentioned above, there are two main species that are likely to take up residence in your home and they are easily recognizable. They are ants whose size varies between 6 and 20 mm, depending on their position in the hierarchy of their society, and their color is either black or brownish.

The problem posed by carpenter ants

Before showing you how to get rid of carpenter ants, it is worth recalling the reasons why you have to do it.
In addition to the annoyance and discomfort that these ants cause you by being in your home, they can indeed damage your wooden structures.
Like termites, carpenter ants dig galleries in the wood, but without eating it (unlike termites). They need to build their nests in wood, and are especially attracted to damp or rotting wood.
The accumulation of the main nest and the satellite nests in wood makes it fragile. It therefore has a greater risk of collapsing in the long run.

When should you worry about carpenter ants?

It may happen that you find one or a few ants in your home sporadically, you should not worry in this case, because it is very likely that they were just passing through.

On the contrary, the presence of carpenter ants should be suspected if:

You see a significant number of them daily circulating on the floor or in the elements of your kitchen.
Ants invading your food.
You catch them on the worn wood of a piece of furniture.
On several occasions, you find fine sawdust on the floor.

Be sure of the presence of ants at home

Here is an effective method to ensure that it is not a simple passage but an invasion that forces you to get rid of carpenter ants: at night, turn off all the lights to let the ants carry out their activity naturally, then take a torch and visit the ground; you will find dozens or even hundreds of ants following the same path, it is the one that leads to the nest which is probably behind a wall.

How to get rid of carpenter ants?

We come to the main point of this article: the ants are there, damage has already been done and we must not delay to act. You will be right to try to get rid of carpenter ants on your own through the following techniques:

1. Find the main nest and destroy it
It is not always easy to locate the main nest of the colony, especially when it is indoors. But it’s a rule: to get rid of carpenter ants you have to eradicate the queen which is in the main nest.
How to find it? follow the path of the ants in the dark.
Once the nest is spotted, eliminate it quickly before the ants move out.

a. Destroy an outdoor nest:

To do this, simply flood it with soapy water several times, sprinkle with red pepper or wood ash. These methods can be effective but short-term.

b. Destroy an indoor nest:

In this case, the best solution is both radical and environmentally friendly: you have to remove the wooden piece where the queen’s nest is located and throw her out of the way. the House. If you can’t remove the latter, you can always dig holes in it to inject insecticides. The most commonly used against ants is borax.

2. Poison the ants
  • Put lavender essential oils on the path of the ants, so you target all the ants that make this path without killing the queen. So it’s not the best solution.
  • Prepare a bait made from a mixture of water, sugar and boric acid or Borax which is a poison. The ants will consume this mixture and bring it to the ants that remain in the main nest and the satellite nests. In a few weeks, all the ants will be poisoned. However, it doesn’t always work as planned, ants can escape from this fish.

NB: in fact, the insecticides that you can buy in stores intended for the public are not very effective against ants and threaten the health of your children. However, those used by extermination pros are truly the panacea.

Get rid of carpenter ants by an exterminator!

You know now that you cannot eliminate a colony of carpenter ants in your house, unless you have a lot of time and a lot of motivation. So how do you get rid of carpenter ants effectively? Failing that, we encourage you to call a carpenter ant exterminator, certified and experienced, who will solve your problem professionally, in a short time and with guaranteed results.

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