Re: HELP! FIRE ANT INVASION!

Robert Allen (Robert.Allen@Eng.Sun.COM)
Wed, 17 Nov 1993 12:33:48 +0800

>>You can use two things to get rid of fire ants, or ants in general.
>>First and foremost, you can use Diazinon. This is s very dangerous
>>chemical (as most pesticides are) that will get rid of ants in
>>about an hour... from the entire facinity. Unfortunately, if you
>>read the packaging, you will find out that it does nasty things
>>to mammals as well. But it is perfectly safe for plants.

I question how safe it is for CP, at full strength, however
I use Lilly Miller Diazanon at 1/2 str. as a foliar spray
on my CP with great results. I'm under the impression
though that the stuff is a contact poison only, and it's
not persistant. I.e., you have to spray the ants directly,
you can't just spray an area for denial to invading ants.
>>
>>The second, much more safe route is Dionasheous earth (I am sure
>>that this is spelled incorretly). There are two types, the first
>>is salt water and the second is fresh water. You want the fresh
>>water. This is the organic farmer's best friend. It is nothing
>>more than the crystalline remains of water going critters. It works
>>like this... you spread this stuff around and the ants walk over it
>>and slices up their armor, causing them to die a slower death through
>>dehydration. You may be skeptical, but I have used this stuff for
>>army ants and roaches in various greenhouses in Maryland and New York

I know New York is tough, but, uh, "army ants"? Was
Charleton Heston there burning the surrounding buildings
down to stop the invasion? :-) [yes, that's an in-joke, about
an old movie]

>>and the proprieters (friends of mine who trusted that I wasn't crazy)
>>were quite pleased witht the results

Very interesting. I believe the spelling is closer to
"diotomaceous". The stuff is very fine grained, and
messy. I've only used it for swimming pool filters.
Gosh, between this and sand, pool stores are rapidly
becoming one stop shopping centers...

Supposedly you can also drive away ants by putting fresh
cut lemons in their path. You have to keep changing the
lemon supposedly for a couple of weeks, but the ants supposedly
go away eventually.

Robert