Ants will find a way
From leaving crumbs of food around the kitchen to not cleaning up after a backyard barbecue, there are plenty of innocent behaviours we do that invite ants into your home. While leaving food out and not cleaning regularly can attract ants, infestations can also arise when there's excess moisture in the wooden structures of your home, and if the infestation is large enough, it can lead to potential electrical issues and property damage. Ants can be responsible for food contamination and associated health risks, and overall irritation to your lifestyle.
Problems and inconveniences of ant infestations
Since ants are mainly attracted to food and moisture, kitchens, laundries, and bathrooms, are often ideal gathering spots. While they are generally not disease-bearing insects like mosquitoes, ants can carry bacterial and fungal organisms that can be transferred to your food or utensils and contaminate it.
Greens Environmental Pest Services are experts in ant pest control and below are some of the most common species we deal with in South Australian homes.
Ant nest, ant colony and ant super colony; what’s the difference?
An ant nest refers to the physical structure or habitat that ants create as their home and is a complex network of tunnels and chambers constructed by worker ants using soil, sand, or other materials.
An ant colony refers to a collective group of single species ants, working and cooperating as a unified society with individuals fulfilling specific roles. A standard colony structure generally has at least one egg-laying queen, with a large population of workers and soldiers. All colony workers and soldiers are female, sterile, and do not lay eggs. Their role is nest construction and maintenance, searching for things to eat or use, tending the brood and queen, and nest defence. For a short period during the summer months, many winged sexual males and females that have grown in the nest will leave on mass to establish new nests. This behaviour is known as ant swarming.
An ant super colony is a larger and more extensive network that consists of multiple interconnected colonies, often spanning larger areas and maintaining harmonious relationships among various nests. Super colonies are unique in their ability to cooperate across multiple nests, sharing resources and showing a higher level of tolerance among genetically related ants, and can reach numbers in the millions.
Argentine Ant
Argentine ants are an invasive species and known for their large colonies and territorial behaviour. They are not poisonous but are aggressive and do bite people. Once spotted it is important with Argentine ants to act quickly because multiple separate nests can combine with each other to build a super colony. These super colonies have big appetites, making them more aggressive and destructive simply due to their sheer numbers.
Black Ant
Native to Australia, black ants, also referred to as garden ants, can often be found in households in South Australia due to their attraction to sweet liquids and foods. These ants are confirmed carriers of salmonella. While not usually responsible for direct damage to the home, they are considered to be a household pest as they will build their nest inside, and can be found in roof and wall spaces, pot plants, rolled up awnings, anywhere really! Black ants can also infest electrical items such as kettles, microwave ovens, computers, or clock radios, which in some cases can lead to electrical problems if left unchecked.
Proactively dealing with black ants as soon as you notice them is best because when numbers are high and multiple nests have been established, regaining control can be tough.
Coastal Brown Ants
Coastal brown ants, also called big-headed ants, are considered a nuisance ant species in South Australia and one of our most successful invasive ant species. They are an urban pest and infestations are characterised by inter-connected tunnels and small mounds of excavated soil at the surface. Their networks can be so extensive that brick paving can be destabilised over time, and the plant roots and lawn can become overly aerated and subsequently die by drying out.
Meat Ants
Spread throughout mainland Australia, these native ants are mainly active during the day. They are active all year round, but their peak activity is during the warmer months, spanning from spring to late autumn.
The nests constructed by meat ants look like raised mounds of dirt, reaching diameters usually up to 1.5 meters. These mounds have lots of entrances, which lead through to separate areas and nesting areas. The largest super colony on record so far spanned 650m and has been recorded by the Australian Museum.
Despite the name, meat ants are omnivorous and are scavengers by nature. Their diverse diet encompasses other insects, some seeds, and a sugar-rich waxy shell produced by certain insects. Interestingly, meat ants adopt the role of farmers, cultivating these insects for their secretion. Unfortunately, this can sometimes cause pest outbreaks of these cultivated insects in trees and orchards surrounding the meat ant nest.
While these ants play an essential role in the ecosystem, they can be a nuisance when in and around the home due to their constant foraging. Plus, these very territorial ants will crawl over feet, climb up legs and bite. Pets can also be affected by these ants climbing up their legs, all over their bodies, and up their noses in food bowls. A bowl of dog biscuits left by the back door, or even inside, will quickly become overrun by ants.
Hopper Ants
Hopper ants - also known as jumper ants, jack jumpers, or jumping jacks - are very aggressive medium-sized ants and are best avoided where possible These aggressive, medium-sized have a black body coupled with large pale jaws and legs. Generally found in South Australia and Victoria, hopper ants earned their name from their ability to repeatedly jump 10cm in any direction when defending themselves.
The reputation of hopper ants is not without merit due to a painful sting and the allergic reactions experienced by some people. Despite their intimidating jaws, venom is injected from their tail end. The quite painful sting usually results in localised swelling. However, some people may have a severe allergy to the venom, with an impact twice that of bee sting allergies. An allergic response to a hopper ant sting can lead to illness, and in severe cases, potentially life-threatening anaphylaxis. If you start to show signs of an allergic reaction to the sting, seek medical advice immediately.
Hopper ants' nests are relatively small when compared to other pest ant species we deal with, only being home to hundreds or thousands of inhabitants. The entrance to the nest often has tell-tale signs of being surrounded by a pile of sand and pebbles. The egg-laying queen can live up to a decade, which is an impressive lifespan for an ant, whereas worker ants have a more typical lifespan of a couple of years.
Inch Ants
Also known as bull ants or sergeant ants, inch ants are native to Australia and are widespread in natural and urban areas. They are amongst the largest ants in the world and will aggressively defend their nest, or even themselves if the need arises. They are larger than the hopper ant but have a similarly dangerous and venomous sting, sometimes up to 6 times that of a honeybee, which can cause anaphylaxis. Their overly large mandibles also deliver a nasty and painful bite.
Inch ants nest underground and the entrance holes are usually large and plain to see. Compared with smaller ant species, whose nests are home to millions of individuals, inch ants have smaller colonies with a few hundred or at most a few thousand individuals. These ants can survive without a queen as the female worker ants can also reproduce. This discovery was reported after a study (https://researchonline.jcu.edu.au/21818/) where during the next three years after collection, worker ants continued to be produced.
These ants have outstanding eyesight and prefer to communicate via signalling to one another rather than via scent, which most other ant species prefer to do. However, they can also communicate via scent but do so to a lesser degree. Inch ants will forage for nectar, other insects, food scraps and animal prey which gets carried back to the nest.
Pharaoh Ants
Pharaoh ants are small, light-yellow ants and are notorious for their ability to establish multiple colonies within a single property as they have multiple queens. This is of particular concern because when disturbed, Pharaoh ants can easily split their colony and build a nest somewhere else. Fortunately, they don’t bite or sting, but if an ant infestation occurs, you need to thoroughly inspect the property and throw away all contaminated food, as these little ants can spread dysentery and salmonella.
Commercial buildings, especially hospitals are of heightened concern, as pharaoh ants can infect sanitary rooms and equipment and can even enter surgical wounds. A single colony can populate a large office building in less than six months. Elimination and control is made difficult because colonies can also break off into multiple smaller colonies and be unaffected by a baiting program, only to repopulate when baiting is withdrawn.
White-footed Ant
White-footed ant nests are more commonly located outdoors and there are generally additional smaller nests all within close proximity, with each nest having a range of queens. These new nests are created by the process of budding, which is where a selection of male and female ants leave the original nest and start a new colony. Their potential for growth is huge due to the many fertile members of these budding colonies. New nests can be found outside in damp areas, such as underneath loose bark, leaves or rocks, within decaying parts of tree trunks and branches, and even aging termite mounds. Once established some colony sizes can grow to estimate tens or even hundreds of thousands of ants.
Agricultural and crop damage is often worse in the presence of White-footed ants as they will protect aphids and other bugs to consume their sweet secretions. By protecting these bugs, it allows them to destroy the plants they inhabit.
Although preferring to nest outdoors, White-footed ant is a species that can establish themselves inside the home, with a preference for wall voids, roof spaces, under eaves, and around skylights. These ants are not a biting insect and primarily feed on sugary foods and occasionally proteins. They quickly become a problem to manage due to the huge population numbers they can reach that constantly forage in kitchens, bathrooms, and the exteriors of buildings. Just like the Black ant, White-footed ants can also infest electrical items in these areas as well.
How Greens can help with ant pest control in Adelaide
Correct identification of the species of ant is the most important start to ant pest control, as different ant species behave in different ways determined by whether the colony is supported by one queen or multiple queens. With over 30 years of knowledge and experience, Greens Environmental Pest Control Services expertly assesses your situation and advises the appropriate treatment. While off-the-shelf ant baits and non-repellent residual insecticides are commonly used for ant pest control, the effectiveness will vary if the treatment isn’t done correctly, and the ant control problem will return.
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