Carpenter ants?

[ksr5377]

I think we might have them.  Lately I have seen some larger black ants in various places, not the little nuisance ones that you usually find in the kitchen,  I did a Google search and it seems like that's what we have.  I found conflicting reports about how to treat them, some saying to get professionals and others offering DIY solutions.  What do you think?  We have only been in this house for a few months so I don't know if this is new this year or something that's been around for awhile.  DH just wants to set out a bunch of the little plastic things with poison in them.  I'm not opposed to this, but as I have been finding them in almost every room of the house I'm getting more concerned.  

[bettyandbob]

I had professionals come. It's my understanding that they cause damage faster than termites, because they aren't eating. They just chew through which is faster I guess.

[J-rap]

Are they in your kitchen?  We've had tiny kitchen ants off and on for years, easily treatable.  For the first time a couple years ago though, we had giant black ones!  Ugh, they were so creepy!  But they were confined to the kitchen and Terro took care of them within a few days.  I'm not sure what kind of ant they were.

[Jenn in FL]

:banghead:  :banghead:  :banghead:

 

 

We had carpenter ants in our rental home.  The tenants just casually mentioned seeing ants in passing and they said they were putting out some bait.  Boy, did I miss the mark on that one! Fast forward to when they moved out and I was stunned.  :ohmy:  The ants were huge and there were a lot of them.  We immediately signed a one year contract with a professional service to treat for them.  After the initial treatment we were seeing piles of dead ants for several weeks.  Utterly mindboggling.    :svengo:

 

IIRC, our one year contract was just over $300 and that included two scheduled treatments and any re-treatment as needed during the  one year agreement.  The problem went away...

[Guest]

Of they are actually carpenter ants and not a look-alike, you need a professional. Think of them as termites, only worse.

[Bensmom]

I have seen the devastation of carpenter ants on HGTV, and am therefore an expert. Call a professional.

 

Now WTM writers, please examine the first sentence of my post. Is there a misplaced modifier or is that correct? Clearly, I am not a writing expert. Lol

[mtomom]

We had them right after we moved in. They literally ate their way in through the wall. I really felt it was overnight--a hole in the wall and ants.

 

We talked to an extension agent for ID and he recommended two different poisons--one was sweet and the other savory maybe--and both for Carpenter. I don't know. But they eat different things depending on their life stage. They ate all of one and disappeared. They came back about a month later, ate some more, and I guess died.

[rwjx2khsmj]

We went with a professional. They treated the effected area and the rest of the house. There was a guarantee. No more ants. We diy fun things. Ants aren't fun.

[school17777]

We found a nest while renovating. A huge nest inbetween the floor of the upstairs and the ceiling downstairs. There was a tree outside near that spot which is where we guess they originally came from. We found it at night and got every piece of nest/ant that we could find by ripping out the drywall ceiling. I googled how to treat and called an exterminator in the morning. She said since I found the nest, that I should go ahead and treat ourselves since we did what they would do anyway. We didn't see any ants after that, or we would have called someone in. The nest smelled like urine. It was so gross. The nest was probably the size of a king pillow. Finding that nest explained why the girls' bedroom had a urine smell in it that I couldn't find. After we removed the nest, the smell was gone. I never would have guessed that the urine smell was coming from the ceiling/floor in their room. I don't recall what made my husband poke a hole in the ceiling to find the nest that we weren't even looking for. We cut the tree down outside too.

 

Good luck in treating it! Hope you find the nest.

[gardenmom5]

carpenter ants can have multiple nests.  could be elsewhere in the house, the yard, the neighbors, the telephone pole they access by the wire from the pole to your house . . . - you have to kill everything or they will be back.

 

I would get a professional.

[Cinder]

We got carpenter ants--along with sugar ants--in a house we were renting. Since extermination was the tenant's responsibility we ended up sprinkling Amdro all around the foundation of the house. We only saw ants again once after it rained but when we reapplied the Amdro they were gone again. Honestly, we never even considered the ants might be inside the walls--even though they were coming in through the ground floor bathroom. :001_unsure:

[sbgrace]

My parents had them. They did damage. My mom was told they are usually nesting outside and then entering the home for foraging. It turned out they were nesting in a tree (maybe two?). You can look for nests by looking for sawdust like deposits. Check the outside of the home at dusk to see if they are going in and out. I hope they are, like my parents, living outside and coming in the house. They did self treat successfully, but I don't know what they used.

Edited April 5, 2017 by sbgrace

[ksr5377]

OK, it sounds like we'll be calling in the professionals.  We had a lot of overgrown shrubs and trees around the house when we first moved in last summer, but we took care of all of that then.  This makes me concerned about them being inside!

 

For those who had treatment done, what exactly did that entail?  Just spraying?  Everything I'm reading says you have to find their nest, how is that possible if it's in your walls?

[Bluegoat]

The traps that work for other ants won't work for carpenter ants.

 

I've had professonals in and they didn't get rid of them in the end, we did it ourselves after paying twice. 

 

There are some tricky aspects though.  One is that they tend to come into the house through wood that is wet or damp - they don't usually bore into good dry wood.

 

The other thing is, often a colony in the house is a sattelite colony from some other place.  You may or may not be able to find the main colony, but you will have to stay vigilant.

[gardenmom5]

remember with carpenter ants - they can have more than one nest.  you have to get all of them.