We always assumed that ant adults were responsible for the care of the colony and that the helpless baby ants depended on adults to feed and protect them. Research has suggested that, instead, baby ants may be the ones responsible for the success of the colony. BABY ANTS ARE NOT ADORABLE AT ALL! For the
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Carpenter ant nests vary greatly in size, location, and structure. Many factors determine what a nest will look like. Moisture conditions and rotten wood differ from a nest in a dry location. Carpenter ants will take advantage of rotten wood, and easy places to start the nest, but as the nest grows, the larvae who
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Because winter just won’t go away, I was moving some firewood into the house in case of a power loss. We really haven’t used much firewood this winter since we got a new furnace so I was surprised to find that my firewood pile seems to have been overtaken by big black ants. Some of
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I read in one of your blogs that if you see carpenter ants inside in the winter it means they are nesting inside your house. I just found a few black ants yesterday and it’s still winter here, so does that mean we have carpenter ants? P. W., Marblehead, MA It probably means that you
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When ants invade a home, it is almost always a case of “If you provide it, they will come.” We’re talking about food. Ants randomly forage out from their colonies, looking for available food sources. If that food happens to be in your house, it’s chow time! In most cases, ants first get into your
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My friend says that if you see big black ants in your house, you’ve got carpenter ants eating your wood somewhere. Is that true? N., Jamaica Plain, MA There are at least three things wrong with that assumption. Big, black ants could be carpenter ants. Carpenter ants are certainly the largest of the common household ant
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All of a sudden, we have little dark ants in our family room. They seem to be coming in around the patio door, even though it’s kept closed. I also see ants on the shrubs outside the door so I guess that’s where they’re coming from. How do I keep them out? P. T., Uxbridge,
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What does carpenter ant damage look like? Just in the last few days, we’ve been seeing large black ants in our house that we’re worried might be carpenter ants. Then my son found a piece of wood trim in the basement wall that was kind of dark and mushy and just fell apart when he
VIEW MOREYes, its true we really do have ‘fire’ ants in New England, but it is not the southern species you may be familiar with. They’ve actually been around for over a century. Myrmica rubra or European Fire Ant was first discovered and written about as a new invasive species by W.M. Wheeler in Massachusetts in
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