On Jul 30, 11:14*am, "Ulysses" wrote:
I have a big problem with little ants. *Not the really tiny micro-ants, but
the red ones that are maybe 1/2" long. *They are surprisingly painful when
they bite you and leave a sizable welt. *I have tried sprinkling the
anthills with Bug-B-Gone and it seems to work for about three days and then
they just open up a new hole and go on about their business. *I even tried
spraying them with Raid but that had little effect. *Anyone have a product
that they like for getting rid of ants? *If it's possible I would prefer a
product that won't kill any birds that eat the ants. *The quail appear to
eat the ants but I can't really confirm this. *In any case they don't eat
enough of them to make a difference so now I'm wondering about anteaters and
if they would like living in Southern California High Desert and if the
coyotes would bother them and if they could actually control the problem.
Seriously.

Get some Phroid Flies...

Stolen without permission from:

http://science.slashdot.org/article..../05/13/2233257

Texas Makes Zombie Fire Ants
Posted by samzenpus on Wed May 13, 2009 10:20 PM

from the what-could-go-wrong dept.

eldavojohn writes

"What do you do when a foreign species has been introduced to your
land from another continent? Bring over the natural predator from the
other continent.

Scientists in Texas have introduced four kinds of phorid flies from
South America to fight fire ants. These USDA approved flies dive bomb
ants and lay an egg inside the ant. The maggot hatches and eats away
juicy tender delicious ant brain until the ant is nothing more than a
zombie that wanders around for two weeks before the head falls off and
the ant dies. A couple of these flies will cause the ants to modify
their behavior and this will be a very slow acting solution to curb
the $1 billion in damage these ants do to Texas cattle ranches and —
oddly enough — electrical equipment like circuit breakers. You may
remember zombifying parasites hitting insects like cockroaches."