Ants?

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zhinu (Laura) Olympia, WA(Zone 8a) Jul 10, 2008

I know ants are pest. They're actually one of my minor phobias, if I get one on me I spend the rest of the day think every little itch is another ant on me. I'm slowly conquering that. I was doing really well till I got bit by one at the graveyard.

My question though is for the garden are ants pest, beneficial, or neutral, and if a pest any ideas on non-chemical ways to get rid of them?

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ecrane3 Dublin, CA(Zone 9a) Jul 10, 2008

The answer is it depends...when they're just crawling around in the garden minding their own business they're fine, they won't damage your plants. Where they can cause problems is that they farm things like aphids and scale, so if you see them crawling on your plants themselves, make sure you take a close look and treat the aphids or scale if you find them since they can hurt your plants. The ants themselves are pretty tough to control even with chemicals let alone without, so unless they're helping out the pests or coming in your house I'd probably leave them alone, I think it's more effort than it's worth to try and get rid of them. If you have areas where you really don't want them though, boric acid is a less toxic ant bait that you can try. I've had good luck controlling them in/near the house with that, but in the garden as a whole the baits don't really work too well.

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zhinu (Laura) Olympia, WA(Zone 8a) Jul 10, 2008

We had to use nasty stuff earlier this year because they were making hills under the foundation. We tried several things and finally had to go up to the big guns. Though we used as little as we could. Generally I have a live and let live policy. If bugs get into the house I try to remove them, but if it's not reasonable to do so I will kill them. If they're doing damage I have to kill them.

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