How To Prevent Having Ants In Your Home? Ants are common household pets and can be a big nuisance. They are not only frustrating to have around your house but can also cause some damage. It can be unhygienic to have ants in your house. Some ants can bite you while others can damage building materials.
Therefore, having a way to keep them out of your house is very essential. Fortunately, there are a lot of effective and easy ant control measures for preventing ants from invading your house, simply follow the tips listed below so that you can enjoy an ant-free and clean home.
How To Prevent Having Ants In Your Home
Clear ant-tempting food away
Typically, ants are mainly drawn to sugary and fatty foods. Therefore, it is essential to keep your home free of these food leftovers as much as possible. You can use sealed containers for meal leftovers, syrups, and baking ingredients. Ants can also be attracted by pet food.
Whenever the ants have infiltrated the food bowl of the pet, you can create a moat of water to prevent the ants from reaching the bowl.
Otherwise, you can feed the pet the food that it can only eat and finish in one go. After the pet finish eating, it is important to rise the bowl to an area where ants cannot reach to eliminate the scent of food.
Clean surfaces vigorously
After eating or preparing food, ensure that you keep your floor and surfaces clean and free from crumbs by eliminating all the messes. You also need to clean around the rubbish bins, couch cushions, chairs, and around kitchen appliances.
If you find that there are some ants on the floor surfaces, you can wipe them using water mixed with vinegar as it will effectively kill them. Moreover, this solution will assist discourage ants from returning to your home in the future since they can smell dried vinegar.
Dirty dishes and leftover food left out around the house may attract ants. Therefore, after eating your meals, it is essential to do vigorous home cleaning. Wipe down kitchen counters, and other surfaces with vinegar/water or cleaning products to make sure that the ants are not attracted by the spills.
Remove sources of water
Ants require water sources for them to construct their colony. Therefore, flooded water systems and leaky taps are common things that attract ant infestations.
With that, it is essential to dry any pool of water that may be formed by water pipe damage. You can also check your bathroom and other parts that are humid to ensure that they are dry.
Find and seal the exterior of your house
Ants are very small and they will easily find a way into your house. If you are not sure how ants are making their way into your house, you can follow any visible holes and trails where they find their entry and exit. These gaps are commonly found in power outlets, loose window frames, and cracks in walls.
After you have identified the ant trails, then you can seal or fill them with plaster, glue, or putty as soon as possible. You can also use weaker materials including Vaseline and Blu Tack for temporary fixes, however, you need to replace them afterward with a permanent solution to prevent the re-opening of the gap after some time.
Clear out ant nests
If you find any ant nests around your home, it is important to break them and cut them off. You can use a spade to make a hole in the nest center and then power hot water into the hole. Do these severally up to when no more ants are coming from the nest.
You can apply an ant barrier (insecticide) around your house foundation as it will steer scouts away ants from your home and will also prevent the ants from entering your house to look for food. These products are accessible in most local hardware stores and will assist to control ants from entering the house.
Whenever you are cutting off the nest, makes sure that you wear protective clothing and long-sleeved clothes to prevent ants from biting you.
Waft strong-smelling substances
Ants usually rely on the sense of smell to locate food. Therefore, if you want to prevent ants from infiltrating areas that have food scraps and crumbs, then you can use wafting strong-smelling substances. These substances include tea tree essential oils, eucalyptus, and Peppermint.
They are natural insect repellents and you can use oil burners and spray cans to deter ants. Nevertheless, you should remember that a lot of essential oils such as tea tree and eucalyptus are very harmful to pets.
Ants are likewise repelled by kinds of stuff like garlic, black pepper, and cinnamon. If you store these items in areas affected by the ants may help to deter them.
Ant baits
There are small plastic containers that have a food substance (such as sugar) mixed with an insecticide. You can use them either outdoors or indoors where the ants are foraging.
Normally, ant baits can be applied as a granule or gel into crevices and cracks or in containerized stations. Once they are lured by the mixer inside the bait, the ants will carry it to their colony and it will kill its members. These baits are ideal in areas where ants travel, including outside doors or near baseboards.
To ensure maximum safety and efficacy, make sure that you properly place the ant baits. Even though ant baits have low toxicity to pets and people, you need to place them in places that are not accessible to pets and children. Make sure that you follow the instruction when using them.
Conclusion
We all know that ants in your home can be troubling and frustrating. Whether it’s carpenter ants living on your deck or tiny ants heading toward the kitchen, no one would like to share space with bugs. We hope that the tips above will help you get rid of ants in your home once and for all.