fireants in my blueberry?

Smokymist

Smokymist

Well-known member
I took a video but I sound like a country bumpkin ( which I am).....but there is a huge ant mount on the top of a pot I have blueberries in..it was under the pot, then I moved the pot,and now it's on top. Will it hurt my plant ?
 
I don't think so. I get ants often in my pots. They are a pain to remove, literally. lol It's possible that with winter coming they are looking for a drier place to set up housekeeping.
 
LadyGT said:
I don't think so. I get ants often in my pots. They are a pain to remove, literally. lol It's possible that with winter coming they are looking for a drier place to set up housekeeping.
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Ok it was like the Aztec ruins when I broke into their dome lol.
 
Figneer

Post in thread 'Ants !!!!'

Figless said:
Looks like a relatively easy solution to a stubbornly difficult problem. If this works on fire ants that would be in dream come true.
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We have been using the commercial liquid for ants inside home and works pretty well after few days, suddenly the ants are gone so I assume it will work for ants outside as long you can place it somewhere where they find it. I just checked the ingredients of the commercial ant liquid that we have been using and its basically is what the man in the video is using. I like the fact that I can make a lot of foil patches and place them around the trees and...
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Check out this thread. There were some good suggestions in it. There is a borax mixture somewhere that’s supposed to work well.
 
Smokymist said:
I took a video but I sound like a country bumpkin ( which I am).....but there is a huge ant mount on the top of a pot I have blueberries in..it was under the pot, then I moved the pot,and now it's on top. Will it hurt my plant ?
Click to expand...
Fire ants are no fun they really can make your feet and legs feel like they’re on fire. I had a friend who was allergic to them and she got rushed to the emergency room. One thing about all ants is they are as busy as bees. They leave no grain of sand unturned. Don’t think they would hurt your plants.
 
Living with fire ants in GA is an everyday thing. They are everywhere. In the lawns, cracks of my driveway, on my okra plants and have been found in my citrus and fig pots. I noticed they are carnivores and look for places which will protect them from rain and flooding. The good thing about them is that they aerate the soil with their tunnels. I noticed they are just like sugar ants looking for nectar in flower blossoms and farm scale.

To eliminate them from my yard, I saw a video saying just to pour boiling hot water on them. I tried this in my lawn and in my raised vegetable beds. It worked! The bad side effect is that the hot water kills the vegetation too. I would rather kill a little bit of grass than deal with an ant mound. lol Grass grows back. My husband swears the borax solution works so I will have to find a way to use it and enclose the solution in something to keep the from dog accessing it.
 
I constantly get bit when mowing or working in the field. I've used various methods to get rid of them from yards but never (so far) had to deal with them in garden or nursery pots. Fun weed eating and having them crawl up your pant leg!!!
 
Fire ants are definitely a curse. When we lived in Texas, they were everywhere and could really take over your yard/property! I used Amdro on our lawn and it worked great. But I never used it in the vegetable garden, since I was not sure if the poison would uptake into the plants and vegetables...I don't think I ever researched that, but just didn't want to take the chance. I've heard that borax method works well also.

I had thought that I was finally rid of fire ants when we moved to East Tennessee...but I am pretty sure they have reached this area now...unfortunately.
 
I would think any bait station would be fine. The ants get it and then take it to share. I don’t think I would sprinkle any granular killer or anything like that.
 
In a pot, I usually put a drizzle of dishwashing liquid. And then water it in part by part. e.g. If you typically water 1 gallon, do 1/4 gallon at a time, wait 30 secs to a minute in between. Or it would overflow with suds and you can have a tray below to catch all that and reapply. Or you can use the formula for spray below for a whole pot soak(I left that in for about an hour). That usually kills most of the ants in the first try.

Then, I pull the rootball out and check the surviving ones. By now, they are in chaos and no time to sting you. And use diluted dishwashing liquid (7 teaspoon to a litre) to spray on to the rest. Put it back in the pot. Come back in 15 mins and pull the rootball to check again.

The toughest one I had to do that spray 2 times. Most were killed in the first wash. The reason to use dishwashing liquid is to clean off their scent. Otherwise, they would keep coming back to rebuild the nest.

For smaller pots, I just use spray but it doesn't penetrate deep enough for large pots.

I have also immersed the whole pot(larger one) into bucket/tubs but then you need more dish washing liquid.

I have tried other non-lethal methods to persuade them to leave but they won't once they start building.

Ants here like to build nests among leaf debris so I make a habit to clean them off the floor or the pots. I have been stung badly multiple times by simply stepping on the wrong leaves.
 
I am in the same situation as the OP. Just found 6-7 fig plants infested. The plants had direct contact with the ground which I knew better. I found them as I was looking for extra trees to give away. As a reward for doing a good thing, I ended up with 2 bites. lol
 
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