*swear*swear*swear* ants!!
seriously, there must be a million of them out there!
all a girl wants to do is plant a dozen assorted daffodils.....
well, it stopped raining, (nothing heavy, just drizzle all day, but it stopped) and the sun came out.
perfect opportunity, right? ground is nice and soft, only a dozen bulbs to go in....(actually 14)
so I went out with my little trowel, a bucket with a bit of blood and bone mixed with a half a cup of dynamic lifter, and saw the ants. hmmm.............what the heck. I'll be real quick. scoop a trench, shake in some fertiliser, drop in the bulbs and cover. along one side of the small brick fence, then I'll step around and do the other edge.
didn't quite work out that way.
I scooped, shook, placed about 5 bulbs and covered them. by then the ants were all over my shoes, socks, pants and heading north.
I swiped off what I could, raced up to the front porch and kicked off my shoes, raced inside and stripped off in the shower. Ants everywhere!
I have one of those hand held shower heads, so I squished and hosed as fast as I could, changed my clothes, put on my rubber boots and grabbed the ant poison.
I went back out and emptied the whole container!
It'll probably rain again overnight, and wash it all away, but hopefully by then enough ants will have taken in the poison and delivered it into the nests. I counted at least a dozen ant holes while shaking out the powder and I'm sure there are more, there will be some inside the fence which is only three bricks high.
Tomorrow I'll go out again and if the ants aren't there I'll put in the rest of the daffodils.
All my other bulbs are going in pots and I'll do that work on my front porch so there'll be no problem, I just need to decide where to place the pots and how many bulbs to put per pot.
all a girl wants to do is plant a dozen assorted daffodils.....
well, it stopped raining, (nothing heavy, just drizzle all day, but it stopped) and the sun came out.
perfect opportunity, right? ground is nice and soft, only a dozen bulbs to go in....(actually 14)
so I went out with my little trowel, a bucket with a bit of blood and bone mixed with a half a cup of dynamic lifter, and saw the ants. hmmm.............what the heck. I'll be real quick. scoop a trench, shake in some fertiliser, drop in the bulbs and cover. along one side of the small brick fence, then I'll step around and do the other edge.
didn't quite work out that way.
I scooped, shook, placed about 5 bulbs and covered them. by then the ants were all over my shoes, socks, pants and heading north.
I swiped off what I could, raced up to the front porch and kicked off my shoes, raced inside and stripped off in the shower. Ants everywhere!
I have one of those hand held shower heads, so I squished and hosed as fast as I could, changed my clothes, put on my rubber boots and grabbed the ant poison.
I went back out and emptied the whole container!
It'll probably rain again overnight, and wash it all away, but hopefully by then enough ants will have taken in the poison and delivered it into the nests. I counted at least a dozen ant holes while shaking out the powder and I'm sure there are more, there will be some inside the fence which is only three bricks high.
Tomorrow I'll go out again and if the ants aren't there I'll put in the rest of the daffodils.
All my other bulbs are going in pots and I'll do that work on my front porch so there'll be no problem, I just need to decide where to place the pots and how many bulbs to put per pot.
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Were those fire ants? If so, they can be dangerous.
ReplyDeleteNext time, no matter what kind of ants they are, put on the boots and spray the boots with ant repellant...lol.
You are braver than I because I would be shedding clothing outdoors.
I think you must be from Oz since you are planting daffodils. Maybe you have something similar. I use an ant killer called Terro. It is found in Lowe's amongst other places. Put it outdoors in bottle caps or jar lids. The ants will swarm and then go away. There is borax and sugar in some magic formula, just two ingredients. Okay, maybe there is water. I get so frustrated trying to make my own poison that I just go buy several bottles at a time early in the year. They came in the bathroom and decided the sink was the place to be.
Haven't I heard you complain about outdoor ants before? Do you have an abundance of ants?
Good luck getting rid of them. A hair just fell on my arms and I thought I had ants on me.
We must have a monster ant farm under our deck cause every year in Spring without fail we end up with a house FULL of ants.
ReplyDeleteThey especially love the kitchen around birthday time. Does my head in! We have yet to find the magic solution to get rid of them for good, so if you do let me know!
Hooray for planting bulbs. Boo and hiss on the ant front. We have a lot too. And I noticed the paver doing a dance (or two) the other day...
ReplyDeleteWe have ant troubles here in spring and summer...I think the house must have been built on a giant ant hill. I keep the little devils at bay with diatomaceous earth.
ReplyDeletePractical Parsimony; welcome to drifting. They are just little black ants,the sort you'd find anywhere. Australia is full of them, with about 50% of the ant population living in the communal gardens surrounding the flats I live in. They're quite a distance from my flat, right at the end of the driveway, I had some nests closer, but filled them with ant poison and the ants moved on. I don't get them inside thank goodness. Once the daffodils are planted I won't worry about ants so much, because everything else I plant will be in pots. I don't walk through the gardens much, I just wanted to brighten up the corner where the driveway meets the footpath, because I can see it from my front door. I'll pop over and say hello shortly.
ReplyDeleteKelley; get a professional pest man in to kill the nest, the cost will be worth it. I'm lucky, I don't get ants inside.
Elephant's Child; those *****ants! drove me crazy trying to get my clothes off without getting ants in my hair. I'll get the rest of the daffodils in by the weekend. I planted three pots today with grape hyacinth, starflowers and bluebells. Then Angel woke up and that was the end of that.
Delores; I only have ant troubles in the yard so mostly it doesn't bother me. They're extra active right now, all moving to higher levels because of coming rain or some such thing.
Before I forget, thank you for supporting me during the A-Z and all your medicinal herbal comments. I've written it elsewhere but don't know if you read it.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you mentioned the ants. I often think I might prefer some other geographic location where it was slightly warmer but I think I like the idea that it freezes most of the year and that seems to keep the bug population down. I ran into a few ants when rock picking but diatomatous earth takes care of the problem.
My daffodiles and tulips are in bloom now and the clumps that I planted give a vivid show of color.
Hope you are rid of the ants. Crawly things really freak me out.
Ants! Now that's something we don't see here at all. There are nests out in the woods, but one never sees them around homes or gardens. Thank goodness, because I do remember them being a royal pain in the arse.
ReplyDeleteBut that aside, your bulbs are goinmg to be wonderful in the spring. We have ours flowering at the moment and its so beautiful - a real splash of bright colour.
Ants are a problem here. We have two kinds; big black fellows that eat wood (we live in the woods) and little teeny brown ones. The black ants that also move on the wood of the house are kept at bay by the pest control man. The little teeny brown ants come in from somewhere, march straight to the plant that drips sap, then march out. We can watch the line, coming and going. I'll take a picture when it happens next.
ReplyDeleteOh you poor girl! Invasion of the ants!
ReplyDeleteThey were just.like.that. in the Hunter, but not up here. Shame I don't get down and dirty and engage in some serious gardening - I wouldn't have to worry about the ants carting me off!
Hope the daffies are in now :)
My blog is ill, so you will see a week-old post, not my usual fare.
ReplyDeleteEvery where I look lately there are ants.
ReplyDeleteI think it is because we had a lot of rain, they were in my sugar and in my jug, I made a cup tea and thought I busted the tea bag but no it was dead ants not a nice taste and I only took a sip.
Merle..................
I agree about the diatomaceous earth, instead of poison.
ReplyDeleteHopefully, there'll be no more ants in your pants :)
Ants are taking over the world...and we've not been warned!!
ReplyDeleteAnts happened to me like that a few years back. I'd gone to check if we had any mail and was standing looking up the street when something bit!! Looked down and had ants heading north up my legs. I was almost naked as I went in the front door. Gosh, they can give quite a nip. Always look downward now when I go up the driveway.
ReplyDeleteThere are lots there now as we had white ants in a gate post and now the black ants have taken over .. they eat the white ants apparently.
We have to replace that gate post soon and I hate to think how many ants are in there waiting for that day.
Hope you managed to get rid of your lot and have planted the daffies OK. Want pics when the flower you know. I think the number of bulbs per pot depends on size of pot.
We in Perth are still awaiting rain. Please send some our way.
Manzanita; if you thanked me on your blog, I read it, but thank YOU for all the extra herbal information.
ReplyDeleteI'll never be completely rid of ants, the complex of flats is a very large block, altogether 107 flats surrounded by gardens, plenty of space for the millions of ants. I just want them out of my particular area and it isn't easy since no one else seems to bother, with some tenants actually throwing food scraps into the gardens. Sigh.
Marie; a royal pain in the arse, yes. Thankfully this lot didn't make it too far above the knees....ha ha. There are just so many! Nests are everywhere! and they are on the move because of the rains.
Joanne; these little black ants are about 3/8 of an inch long, they are the ones that move in where termites have been I believe. With the grounds here covered in wood chip mulch the conditions are ideal for them.
Rose~from OZ; daffs aren't in yet, I was out for most of the day and haven't checked the ant situation out there yet. Tomorrow is soon enough.
Practical Parsimony; I clicked on your name and got nowhere, could you type your blog name here? Then I can pop over as soon as your blog recovers.
Merle; the rains definitely have something to do with it. I don't get them inside thank goodness and just in case, I keep my sugar in a sealed canister.
Vicki; I'll stick with ant powder since that is what I have handy. I only need to get rid of the few million ants along my section of driveway long enough to plant the daffodils and maybe the ranunculus too.
Lee; consider yourself warned. Cockroaches too, maybe even earwigs. All the creepy crawlers in fact.
Mimsie; my very first memory of ants was me screaming and dad rushing me into the bathroom and holding me under the tap. I think I was three and had stood on a nest without noticing the ants. Pretty sure it was Adelaide. I've never had such a bad ant problem in any other city I've lived in.
I'm imagining that gate post being pulled out and a veritable river of ants swarming out of the hole.