I hate them. I thought they'd be gone by now, and they mostly are, but they still pop up from time to time. I think that they are fireants, though they aren't big. We have fireant hills all over the sub division. The natural response would be to call a pest controller, but I'm not paying orkin $120 initially and $70 every two months. It simply isn't happening.

I've got no food in the house. I have a sprayer. I've tried the $5-10 bottles of spray from home depot, but they're crap and don't really do anything.

I did order a knockoff brand of Demon WP from the net a while ago (cypermythrin is the active ingredient) and it killed a lot of them, but that was a while ago. Is it the best method? I could order an awful lot of the stuff for $120, and if I understand correctly all that orkin does is basically spray the same stuff right? If so, are there guides on how to do it without poisoning myself and/or family?

I've given these ants a lot of breathing room and quarter in the past, and I've had it up to here with them. They have no appreciation for my mercy, so they all must die.

PS - if cypermethrin products are the ones to use, would be it be possible to get one locally? I live in AL. I had to order the other stuff on the net. Home Depot did at one point carry a watered down CM product, but it was not the tough stuff I got from the net :D

If you have the same ants that I do, you have what are called "ghost ants" or "sugar ants". They are tiny, tiny non-biting ants. The only way to eradicate them is to make sure you conscientuously apply liquid treatment to your interior and exterior as well as granules throughout your yard. You also have to keep the inside of your home spotless. ANY food particles or even just standing water attracts them. So keep your sinks dry, make sure you don't have leaky faucets, etc. You'll see them more in winter because they come inside looking for food/water/shelter.

I have battled them for years at my house and I'm a total neat/clean freak. If I get them out of the kitchen, they turn up in the bathroom. If I kill them in one bathroom, they turn up in the other one. I even once had them in my man-cave which only houses my computers and my guitars - I never eat food in there.

Like I said, in time, if you're conscientuous, they'll disappear. Right now I seem to have defeated them in and out of the house. But that may only be because I haven't found where they're nesting yet... little bastards.

I had those at my old place, but these ones are biters. They are horribly little buggars. They are a redish body with a black butt, I think. They seem to be pretty small, always on the lower end of the fireant official size, but they are within the official size.

They are merciless biters. They won't crawl on you without biting, and they bit skoorbaby as she was asleep last night. I think only once, but that's why we're going to stop trying to wait them out. The bites hurt and/or itch, and there is a nice little pussy spot that stays for a while. I was sun tanning this summer and rewarded with a direct bite to the nether regions.

I don't know what they are eating, as there haven't been bugs around for weeks (it's too cold), but damnit they're eating something! It doesn't help that others in my neighbor are lazy with their ant-fighting duties. My neighbor at one point had a MASSIVE hill on his back patio and let the thing just grow until it finally died. I had to sneak over to his property one night with my poisons, because he was derelict in his duties.

Wow. I never get fireants inside the house. I get them in the yard, though, and you're right, they're merciless.

I use a chemical called "triazicyde" from Home Depot. I use the liquid and spray it from the roof soffets to about 3~5 feet away from the house. I then treat to the property line with ant killing granules. I spray the outside of the house once a month, then treat the whole yard every three months. I spot treat ant mounds in between. I can't win the war because my neighbors don't take care of their yards so I empathize with your fight.

Don't trust the exterminator services to do anything for you. I hired them for 8 months and it didn't help. Actually, what really helped the most is the residual killing effect that came when I had the house treated for termites last year (a nest was found in my culdesac but luckily they hadn't spread to my house yet).

I'd move Skoorbaby to a "clean" room for now and spray the daylights out of her area, then wait a day. Scrub up the room with soap and water to remove residual chemicals once you see that the little bastards are dead.

I may see if my local HD has that stuff, and still order some super-killer off the net.

I think they are in the house because they're desperate for food. I found them in a cat bowl outside (we keep one for the neighbor's cat heh) and they were very tiny baby ones. I killed them. But, with little food outside I think that they are desperate, which is why they're in the house.

The dumb things have yet to find the master cat bowl. They found it last year, but this year they've not found it and it's a huge bowl full of about 3 lbs of food ready for the taking!

i'm pretty sure you probably already do this, but i trace my ant trails to the point of origin, usually a crack in the wall or something, & just spray the entrance like hell. usually they find some other crevice to enter through, but then i just spray that too & in a couple of days, they have no other entrance & that takes care of it for me. it sounds like your ants might be a lot more aggressive than mine tho!

there are some organic ways of deterring the ants, i think rubbing garlic everywhere was one? you might look for some of these methods to use in skoorbaby's room (hehe, skoorbaby, how cute).

I had termites a few years ago, with some ants as well though not as bad as you describe. Thankfully I have a great termite guy (local, NEVER go with the big name services) and he applied a product called termador, which is good for about 5 years. When I asked his partner about the ants, he said Termador actually works on them as well. Well, I have to say I haven't seen an ant nor a termite since.

You may need a more aggressive treatment such as the above.

Good luck!

I use a chemical called "triazicyde" from Home Depot.
That's the stuff, works great! We actually had a neighborhood meeting where we got everyone together and came up with a unified plan of attack to take them out at every house. This is the first year that we haven't had a major fireant infestation.

We had sugar ants everywhere on the kitchen counters this summer. Went to the Wal-Mart garden dept and picked up some “Grant’s Ant Traps”. They still put arsenic in them. After that no more ant problems.

you know the EASIEST way to get rid of them is burning down the house and moving far far away.... heh.

my wife and I have been lucky in the ant department. we had bees though - man that sucked. our cats loved it though since they now had small flying things to jump at in the air. they built a nest in the attic. ugh. they're gone now thank goodness.