How to Get Rid of Ants in Your Kitchen

Getting rid of ants in your kitchen could take weeks even when using common household ant killers that kill ants on contact. In fact, ant spray instructions inform users pesticides can remain on sprayed surfaces for weeks (some brands for months).

Agreeing to allow ant spray to remain affixed to sinks, cabinets, and counter tops might sound great as users read on to discover that during the weeks the pesticides remain they continue to rid homes of ants. A little further label examination, however, should remind users that ant sprays are “pesticides”. They contain ingredients like imiprothrin and cypermethrin. That is why they kill pests – ants. This means leaving ant spray around your home is the equivalent of leaving poisonous material around your home.

Ants cannot avoid the fact that they are annoying at picnics or infuriating in human households. They cannot help that humans find them pesky little creatures that become overly persistent when their sensors detect and locate food sources. It is only ant nature that whether food sources are sweet things like candy, gum, and cake, or salty goods like chicken, bacon, and chips, ants are compelled to zero in on detected foodstuff like sharks approaching blood. In addition, ants cannot help that no matter how clean humans keep their homes, they can still wake up one morning to find ants invading their kitchens.

Forming lines like soldiers in warfare, ants lift food specs several times their body weight and scurry across floors, tables, and counter tops carrying ware like dads toting groceries.

When humans spot ants in their kitchens, they turn into television commercial actors, and begin spraying ant trails as if insecticides were not poisons but aromatic cleaning solutions. No matter how thin or thick the trails, sprayers saturate floors, walls, sinks, dishes, counter tops, and even pantries with wet greasy poisonous spray determined to get rid of ants in their kitchens – or other areas in their homes; and then – just like that – those pesky little ants instantaneously keel over and lay dead.

Then what does a user do? Ant spray instructions fail to mention what to do once initial spraying results in killing ants. They only tell users to apply more product as needed; and yet, no insecticide user wants to leave dead insect messes around their homes to see if more pests come the next day or next week so they can die from the same spray application.

A better way to get rid of ants in your kitchen is to reduce the amount of ant spray you spray and to use ant-eliminating methods that do not require spraying. Using less spray is better for your lungs and less risky for your family because less insecticide befalls your kitchen and your interior atmosphere. All righty then – getting rid of ants in your kitchen requires:

Step 1 – Whenever you see an ant in your kitchen do not dismiss it because it is only one little ant and could not possibly do much harm. Instead, view one little ant as the “scout” that it is and get rid of the little bugger. Ants do not appear in kitchens in streams simply because they all wake up one morning and decide to visit Nancy. They appear all together because a scout or a few scouts hunted your kitchen down and found foodstuff that ignited their senses. Then they went to the nest and told their fellow ants to “follow that scented trail!”

Step 2 – If you miss the scouts or you simply were unable to prevent scouts from relaying their signals to fellow ants, and thus your kitchen is graffitied with ant trails upon your initial ant invasion discovery, follow the trails to wherever the ants are entering the kitchen. More than likely, you will find an “ant hole”. Spray the insecticide of your choice in and around the hole. Be mindful of the hole location. If pets or small children have access to the area, you will have to clean around the hole during the cleanup process.

By spraying only the holes from which ants come and go you eliminate the amount of poison you lay about your kitchen and greatly reduce the amount of poisonous fumes circulating through your home. At any rate, you should open a window or door if possible in order to air out the area more rapidly.

Step 3 – Using warm water from the faucet, moisten a sponge or cleaning cloth and wipe up the ants. (Using soap is optional since you did not spray insecticide all over the place.) Alternate the tasks of collecting ants on your cleaning apparatus with rinsing and washing the pests down the drain. You may need to rinse the sink here and there as ants attempt to escape going down the pipe. Continue the process through cleaning up all the ants and then, if necessary, soap down the area where ants were coming through the hole.

Step 4 – Apply a coat of caulk or some other hole-stopping agent to the ant hole in order to keep more ants from coming through. If the hole is not a hole, per se, for instance, ants were coming through a baseboard; you may have to skip the caulking because you do not want to ruin your home décor. In either case, check the area daily for the next week or so to make sure no more ants appear. If they do – get rid of them right away.

Do not take it for granted that because you caulk a hole you will be forever ant free. Ants are smart persistent little devils and will search for additional holes near and away from holes they used previously. They will also search for alternative entries in completely different areas of a kitchen once they label a location as great for dining.

Step 5 – Set out ant traps in areas where it is safe to do so if ants are found in such areas. For example, if you find ants in the pantry, you must remove the food from the pantry, toss out infested products, and clean away scampering ants. Once pantry has been cleaned, and holes filled where applicable, place ant traps toward the back of the pantry, out of reach of children, according to ant trap instructions.

Step 6 – Refrain from leaving open packages in the panty or anywhere else in the kitchen. If necessary, purchase airtight containers and use them for sweet cereals, cookies, and candies. Do not leave glasses or cups of sweet beverages on the counter, the table, or in the sink. Ants love Kool-Aid type beverages, sodas, and sweetened teas. When kids drop candy, no matter how small, have them pick it up and trash it. If someone spills a sweet beverage, wipe or mop it up right away.

Step 7 – Keep trash cans clean. This means indoor and outdoor trashcans. Removing indoor trash bags from trash cans whenever they are full is best for saving money on plastic bags – good environmentally too. However, when dealing with ants emptying indoor trash bags may be necessary. Wash indoor and outdoor trash bins as needed to cleanup ant attracting food spills.

Step 8 – Investigate outdoor ant trails and rid any trails wherein ants are headed through outdoor holes to get inside your home. Plug holes after killing as many ants as you can.

Learning how to get rid of ants in the kitchen is really pretty simple. Applying the procedures religiously in order to keep ants from coming back to the kitchen may be the more difficult of the two tasks.

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