Help! I have killed 200 red ants in the house today
 

Yesterday I left the sliding glass door for a few minutes and had 10 red ants coming through into the house. I killed the ones that had made it inside and didn't think more about it. Red ants have never been a problem, even though they are common outdoors.

This morning at the door into this room, which is my workout room, as well as things, there were probably 50 red ants! After trying to just step on them, it become war and I got the shop vac. I would take breaks every few minutes from working out and kill ants. Finally the ant war won, I quit working out. I still check every few minutes and kill at 5 or so at a time. There is no food in the room where they are, but starting finding them closer to the kitchen.

The outside walls and deck of this room had a lot of red ants. I vac them and washed with soapy water the wall and the deck in the area, to hopefully ruin their scent trails. Put a layer of baking soda between and the outdoor wall. Maybe they are coming through the attic? Seen only ants a couple feet up on the walls, so maybe not coming through the attic. Hard to get into the attic for me to check. Only a few seen in the area of the sliding glass door.

Any ideas to stop this? All ideas appreciated! I do have a cat & a dog, so don't want anything that would harm me or them.

We had an ant problem a few years ago, tried the standard do it yourself stuff like borax & sugar, diatomaceous earth, etc. We ended up consulting a professional exterminator that used environmentally friendly methods. Haven’t had a problem since.

Thanks Pam for your suggestion of a professional exterminator. I live in a rural area about an hour away from any city, so not sure if any are available. I just asked on a local facebook group.

Ant colonies send out forgers/soldiers to hunt for food. If you see just one ant it is typically a forger. If you see multiple ants then it means the forger has found food for the colony and they are coming to pick it up. Forger ants leave a trail smell so they typically use the exact same path over and over to enter your house. And yes they can have multiple tracks. Some ants eat sweets but some don't. We have had carpenter ants that only eat sweets during a quick feeding period in the spring and then live off of protein.

I am guessing your ant are feeding now which is good. It makes it easier to kill the colony. An exterminator will work. If you want to try DYI first, I have successfully used Terro Liquid Ant Killer. You have to put it in the path of the ants. If you have pets or children I would close the door to the room. They provide little cardboard dots to place the liquid on. I got aggressive once and cut out my own larger cardboard squares and used 3/4 of the bottle. We had a situation like yours and we were going out of town for a week and I wanted to make sure they were gone when we got home. Most were dead in 48 hrs. The enclosed terro ant traps have never worked for me.....that I know of.
https://www.terro.com/terro-liquid-ant-killer

This product is basically borax and sugar like Pam used. It is usually available at Loews, Homedepot or a hardware store. GoodLuck!

I second Carly's advice on Terro ant baits. The ants take the bait back to their friends and kill the colony. I had an ant problem a couple of years ago and put out a Terro ant bait. I was SHOCKED at how many ants appeared to drink the liquid. But don't be surprised if you see a lot of ants, this is expected. After a few days all your ants will be gone. And it is safe for pets so you don't have to worry about your dog and cat.

Don’t know if this product will work on red ants, but I had good luck with Zevo spray.

The deck and the room where the ants are coming in are over large flagstaff patio, that is built just on top of our sandy soil. Always see a lot of red ants on top of the stones and climbing up the wall to the deck. I would guess it is ant apartment city below the stones.

Because it was something I could this afternoon (and have killed at least 300 inside now), I vacuum up the baking soda, that what I thought would worked. Than put a mixture of borax, sugar and warm down instead. But it on the deck and also below the ants are climbing up to the deck. Hopefully they will be distracted by the sugar, until it kills them and not want to come inside my house. I go the local hardware store and see if they have on of these ant traps. The dog and cat are not suppose to be in this room anyway, so could use the traps in there.

Carly-Thanks for your info. I have seen about 5 ants scouting out the house, the rest are staying in the area between the 2 rooms. It helps to understand what their motivation is.

At my house, extended dry weather sometimes seems to drive them in search of water.

I put out some of the little ant bait things from the grocery store and haven't had a problem since.

It's been the opposite here-we have had one of the wettest Springs on record. Also cool until recently, so plants are behind where they usually would be. Maybe more ants have been born or survived or the season been delayed making them travel more for food?

Going with the borax/sugar is the best first step to get rid of the invasion.

In recent years I have been spreading bug killing granulars in spring and again late summer around the perimeter of my house. It kills ants, spiders, roaches, etc. This shaker product has made it real easy. You may want to consider using this to eliminate future problems. I have a slate stone patio and I actually spread it on the stones and let it sit for a couple of weeks.

https://www.terro.com/terro-ant-killer-plus-t901-6