Fire Ants almost got him

[stevenf]

Dennis, The problem typically with fireants and livestock is usually limited to the young and the old. We have a lot of trouble in drier years with our fawn crop being deminished by fireants, new borns don't stand a chance. I'm not sure but I expect a mature animal with no health problems got their lesson somewhere along the way to avoid them and the old are at risk because if they lay down they are slow to get up and if in the wrong spot are quickly covered.
On a lighter note I do a lot of tent camping with the Boy Scouts and one summer it was terribly hot so I had an ice chest in the tent with me for cold water as I was feeling a little rough that evening. The little buggers ate thru my tent in many places climbed all over me without my knowledge and then one of them blew a whistle and they all bit me at once. I flew out of the tent it was right at sunup yanking my clothes off as I flew, I'm standing naked outside my tent brushing the rest off when I one realized I'm on a campout with scouts and today it is not a good thing to be caught naked around a group of young boys because of all the weirdness in the last years but also this was the family campout and there were multiple moms camping as well. I quickly braved the tent long enough to grab some fresh clothes. I had welts from head to toe for weeks. Thank God I was quiet or I'd have been tarred and feathered and tied to a fire ant mound by all those mad moms.
Steve

 

[slydog]

GRITS! EAT GRITS!?!! Ha Ha... we don't EAT grits down here in the south! We just talk silly northerners into eatin' em. /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif

Actually, I love em with a lotttt of butter and sugar. And if you've never eaten garlic cheese grits with shrimp, you don't know what your missing. As far as the fire ants go, I've never heard of killing them with grits.

 

[EddieWalker]

I've tried Amdro with limited results. Sometimes it works, sometimes nothing happens. I can spread it on a dozen mounds and be lucky to kill half of them. Othro is about the same.

I haven't tried Bengal, but will give it a try.

Next time I go shopping I'll buy some grits and see what that does. I'll put Peyton in charge of that project. Being 4 years old, he loves to have projects.

Putting a steam cleaner on a tractor, or towing it behind a trailer sounds pretty interesting. I wonder if adding something to the mix would increase the effectiveness.

Would alcohol, amonia, chlorine or something else injected several feet into the mound with steam kill them off?

 

[LarryD]

<font color="blue"> GRITS! EAT GRITS!?!! Ha Ha... we don't EAT grits down here in the south! We just talk silly northerners into eatin' em. </font>

We used to spot the tourists at the local saloons because they were drinking Lone Star... /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[Westonium]

Just boil some water. and pour it into the mound. I've tried alcohol, chlorine, others on a carpenter-ant infested tree and frankly it just pissed them off.

Boil as much water as you can safely transport. If you happen to have an outdoor fry-cooker, that works better since you can set up near the hills.

It is even more effective if you can use a hoe on the mound to open things up for the water as it is being poured. Those ants are instantly dead. I did this on probably 100+ mounds in Pratsville AL when I lived there.

I met them for the first time in USAF tech school in Biloxi. I had to collect the outdoor garbage bags from the garbage barrels during break. Those things swarmed up under my camos and bit me all at once. I flopped around like a crappie on a hot metal boat floor. Oh good times.

If you enjoy the fun of formic acid injections - go wander around in some stinging nettle wearing shorts. Same sensation and effect (same venom). Did that in Big Bear, CA. I proceeded to stand in 40 degree stream water for the next 2 hours.

Back to the water: You can always hit them more than once. See if there is signs of life after an hour. If there is - hit em again. The workers will try to rescue any eggs and things they think are still viable.

I swear that the hotter it is outside, the angrier they get.