Ants are Amazing Creatures – Organised, Committed and Smart.
These six-legged invaders start to become more active and visible between the spring and summer months, entering your home in numbers. They play an important role in our environment and in our gardens by recycling organic matter and aerating the soil. However, we would rather not have them throwing a party in our homes. So, let’s explore how prevent ants from entering to home.
What Are Ants Attracted To?
If you’ve ever seen a line of ants marching through your garden door, towards your kitchen worktops or food waste caddy, you may wonder what exactly they’re attracted to. The answer is simple: food, water, and a place to call home.
Food Hunt
Ants usually come into the house in search of food. These tiny travellers are omnivores and will consume pretty much anything they can find, from sugary sweet snacks to savoury meats including your pet’s food. These tiny invaders are on a mission! If you leave crumbs or sticky jam residue on your kitchen worktop, they’ll happily follow the scent trail. Once they’ve found a food source, they’ll quickly call for reinforcements to come and help carry it back to their colony. Ants will use a variety of methods to communicate with their buddies, including chemical signals, visual cues, and even physical touch and pheromone trails.
The ants are at their busiest when these trails are established, with ants strictly moving in working lines carrying small pieces of food back to the colony sites. This is where ants draw on their incredible strength, able to carry objects that are many times their own body weight. They achieve this using their powerful jaws and key muscles in their necks and heads.
The solution? Keep food sealed in containers and promptly wipe up spills from countertops and floors. Even the tiniest crumbs can tempt them.
Water Quest
Ants also seek out water, especially during warmer weather. If they find a good water source (like a leaking pipe or a pet’s water bowl), they’ll leave a scent trail for the rest of their colony. In fact, ants can’t live without water for more than a few days. You’ll usually see lines of ants leading up to water sources, around sinks, leaky pipes or kettles.
Shelter Seekers
During the warmer months in Spring and Summer, we’re still likely to experience showers of rain, which can force ants to come indoors and crash inside, to escape these weather changes. When it rains and floods their outdoor nests, they’ll scurry inside, seeking dry ground. They will also want to keep their queen safe and warm. Without her, most ant colonies wouldn’t survive.
How to Prevent Ants from Entering Your Home
If you want to keep ants from marching into your home uninvited, don’t give them a reason to invade your home in the first place. You can take preventative steps to ensure that your home isn’t an attractive environment for ants, with no access to food, water and shelter.
Remember, ants will use all their senses to locate those small crumbs of food, and sugary items left on the worktop, so be sure to clean up any spills or crumbs as soon as they happen.
Seal Cracks and Gaps
Use caulk, sealant or filler to seal cracks in garden doors, window sills, doorways and walls. This prevents ants from squeezing into tight spaces and infiltrating your house.
Ant-Proof Entrances
Seal off entrance points, ensure windows and doors are tightly sealed. Ants won’t be able to wander in through gaps. For those that can’t stand ants or any other insects, you could go one step further by installing screens on your windows and doors to keep those pesky ants and insects out.
Airtight Food Containers
Ants can detect even the tiniest trace of food. Store food in containers that ants can’t infiltrate. This prevent ants from being lured by tasty treats.
Remember, property proofing and prevention is better than dealing with an ant infestation. Keep your house clean, clear spills promptly, and maintain good hygiene in food preparation areas. Let’s keep those little six-legged explorers out of our living spaces!
If you’re tired of ants invading your home without an invitation, it’s time to call in the experts to send those pesky insects packing. Say goodbye to ants in North London with Sparta Pest Control.
