Ants have moved into my coop and run to eat the leftover and spilled crumble. These are red ants that have a very painful sting that leaves a pus-filled blister. I dust my coop and run with diatomaceous earth on a regular basis, and all of the wood shavings I use are dusted as well. This doesn't seem to make a significant difference. Any suggestions? I'm not going to lock up a bunch of chickens and have them bitten and stung with no means of escape. Thanks, DD
Besides the sevin maybe some ortho home defense spray with bifen around the perimeter of the coop/run. If you do a search through *do your own pest control* sites they might have some more organic methods.We have some type of red ants in the yards and along with the black they bite so I spray them with the Ortho(kills on contact).
I got an email some time back that said cornmeal, sprinkled around would kill them. I tried it on a fire ant mound and within about a week and a half, the mound was dead. Seems the ants eat the corn meal and can`t digest it, so they die. I have sprinkled it on other fire ant mounds with the same result. Should work on your red ants and won`t hurt the birds...........Pop
I make a homemade ant bait that is safe around other animals and children. Mix two cups of water and two cups of sugar in a saucepan and boil it until it gets thick and syrupy. (I suppose you could also use pancake syrup, but I haven't tried it that way) Remove from heat and mix in two or three tablespoons of Borax. When it has cooled, put it into shallow dishes and place them around where the ants are coming into your coop (on the outside would be best or your chickens will just eat the bait). They will eat it and the Borax kills them, plus they will carry chunks of it back to feed the queen. There is not enough Borax in it to harm chickens, other animals, or kids.
I had ants going into my coop but they were going in through cracks in my coop. I just caulked the cracks...they hate that too. I still see them around but not actually going inside single file anymore lol.
I use DE (Diatomateous Earth) it's totally organic and non-toxic to chickens, you and and any other mammal, but deadly to creepy crawleys including ants. Great to put in the coop or in the chickens dust baths because it controls parasites and mites. Ok so I see you use the earth already, sorry!!
DE..does not work worth crud..in my opinion. As you've also found out...because its not working for you either... If you really want to get rid of the ants..you NEED somethng like sevin dust..or andro ant block..or bug sray.
Dogdollar, check out this website: http://www.arbico-organics.com/category/pest-solver-guide-ants They are a great company that I use for all sorts of bio-control and have a number of good products for controlling ants.
