Friday, March 25, 2011

A Public Service Announcement - Death be to Fire Ants

Yep, still no cider...but I am sipping a Shiner Bock at the moment, isn't that close enough?

No, I don't think so either...but onto the subject at hand...Fire Ants, or more accurately, how to f'ing kill the little f'ers! (No, they don't like me either.)

Now, if you live in the south, and many of us do, you have no doubt been introduced to the presence of these little critters from south of the border. Yep, that's right folks, much like the Africanized bees that are illegally crossing our border as we speak, the Fire Ant was the one that showed them the way (makes one wonder...can Fire Ants swim? I digress).

So you have several options...gasoline and fire (a redneck's favorite), poisoning (expensive and if you want it in your water, put it on the ground), or the organic, non-toxic, totally natural, tree hugging, hippie dippie method of Fire Ant death...


Yep, grits...I crap you not.

It works like this...Ant sees grit, ant eats grit, ant gets thirsty and goes down into hill for water OR even better, takes grit to queen ant on her little dirt fire ant throne and lets queen eat the grit. Then ant drinks water. Grit expands, ant does not, ant does the best impersonation of popcorn it can.

If it doesn't kill the hive outright, it will force the hive to move to more "environmentally friendly" pastures.

How much does one use? Well, that depends on the hive...but I just use  enough to cover the top of the hill with a thin layer. Every other day or so I check and see if it need a new dusting and poke the hill with a stick...if ants come out, they get more grits until between ten days to two weeks later the hill looks something like this...


Notice the caved in tunnels? The dry center? The layer of new growth? This hive is gone.

And, not only is it clean, non-toxic to Yankees (yeah, try telling a northerner that grits taste "good", Life Partner is sitting here saying "Grits are GROSS!") and pets, but are cheaper than dirt (should know after buying all that potting soil)...at about $1.00 to $1.30 per can at the local Mega Mart.

So, I hope this post helps and you too will be living the life of a Fire Ante free homestead, urban or otherwise.

Peace folks! :-)

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