Do not let the spring season let you down when you find ants in your home. Ants can be frustrating and should not be ignored. One ant, is not just one ant. Those large black ants, will not just "disappear." Ants are social insects, which means they live in large colonies consisting up towards a millions of ants. When carpenter ants are in your home, think again before treating on your own...carpenter ants can be more troublesome to treat.
1. Carpenter ants are more than just a nuisance... inside your home, they can actually destroy it. In some parts of the country, ants causes more costly damage to homes than termites, which cost homeowner over $1 billion each year. Carpenter ant damage is described next!
2. These wood-destroying pests carve tunnels and chambers... through the wood of your home, not to eat it, but to form passageways, galleries and nesting sites. This type of activity will produce frass, a sawdust type material a sign of carpenter ants.
3. Your home is a natural attraction... providing an idea environment for a colony with year-round warmth, moisture food and water.
4. Carpenter ants build nest and passageways deep inside the wood in your home... the frame, the floors, even voids - making the ants in the home very hard to locate and reach.
5. Seeing just one may mean big trouble... you will only see a small fraction of the colony. There may be a hidden nest of thousands just a few feet away; either outside your house or even inside!
6. Once a colony reaches maturity, it begins to produce winged reproductive ants... these ants will now establish new colonies nearby.
7. It takes just 66 days for a queen to produce a functioning colony... due to the carpenter ant's rapid life cycle. A mature colony takes 3 to 6 years to mature and contains as many as 10,000 workers.
8. Often, their presence is not known until damage has already begun... Eliminating an ant problem early can avoid costly repairs rebuilding and replacement.
9. Carpenter ants prefer moist wood... most common are porches, decks and eaves, but they quite often burrow through and destroy dry wood as well.
10. Carpenter ants can survive the toughest conditions... For example, ants bodies generate natural antifreeze that enables them to survive extremely cold weather. Their body fat alone can sustain them for up to 6 months. Learn more about carpenter ants during the winter.
11. Carpenter ants can live for well over six months without food or water... they can survive temperatures down to -1 F, and will resort to cannibalism so that the colony can survive for long periods.
12. Carpenter ants forage for food mostly at night, traveling as far as 300 feet from the colony... by following their own scent trail. Since this occurs after dark, homeowners are often unaware of the extent of their infestation problem.
13. One of the largest ants, they can inflict a painful bite... which is aggravated by the formic acid the ant injects into it.
14. Carpenter ants are exceptionally hard to control... because they live within the wood, where they are difficult to locate and treat. Avoid over the counter products or treating ants on your own.
15. The problem is made worst by the fact... that the original nest usually serves as the starting point for many satellite nests, located throughout your home and outside it as well.
The best way to get rid of ants in Clifton Park NY is to locate and treat the nest directly. Carpenter ant control is sometimes easier said than done, why you should contact an ant removal specialist right away. Big black ants require the Schenectady ant control experts to locate and kill the ant colony. With ant scent trails between the satellite and parent colonies, over the counter products will not fully treat carpenter ant infestations and solve them.
As the weather warms up, do not worry about a carpenter ant infestation. Contact Thomas Pest Services who will address your ant problem quickly using the most up to date technologies to exterminate the carpenter ant nests. Contact your Ballston Spa ant removal specialists, whether it’s one ant, ten ants, piles of sawdust or other signs of ants. Do not let these insects continue to damage your structure, contact Thomas Pest Services for a free inspection and to learn more about ant control services.