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method for stopping leaf cutter ants on trees


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In our constant fight to stop cutter ants from denuding three olive trees...we were told about a very simple solution:

Wrap a wide sheet of saran wrap, twice around the tree at waist height. Secure with masking tape or painters tape. place an inch wide circle of vaseline around your saran wrap...not too much or it will melt and run off your 'trap."

You will need to renew your saran as it gets full of ants or aphids. I am bringing back "tanglefoot" from the US...which will not run or melt...but the vaseline has stopped the little "bastards" for now.

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I wish that there was such a simple solution for potted plants. Our gardener has put down some kind of white powder on the leaves and it does seem to help but it isn't a cure.

no, the powder dessapear when the next watering.....or rain....

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We've tried the powder, pouring stuff down the holes, etc, etc. The only thing that has worked consistently for us is something called Trompa in pellet form.

You find the hole and the trail and sprinkle it along the trail. They take it into the hole and it kills the nest.

There's something similar also available but the pellets are too large and they won't pick them up and take them into the nest. You can get the Trompa at the garden store in Riberas next to the 7-11. They have small and large size packages.

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I use Tree Tanglefoot like the OP suggested and it works very well on trees. Much more effective than Trompa, Patron, Hormigol, Fito Klor, etc. The Tree Tanglefoot won't really work on plants that have multiple stems or multiple places where the plant makes contact with the ground or a wall.

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I use Tree Tanglefoot like the OP suggested and it works very well on trees. Much more effective than Trompa, Patron, Hormigol, Fito Klor, etc. The Tree Tanglefoot won't really work on plants that have multiple stems or multiple places where the plant makes contact with the ground or a wall.

That's why the pellet-type ant poison work so well. And your pets are not in harm like with the white powder.

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I like to find the cutter ants holes and pour a liquid ant killer down the holes. Someone explained on this forum that the ants haul the leaves underground and grow a kind of mold on them, which they eat. So Clorox and water down the hole will be effective as well, and cheaper. The holes are recognizable by a pile of sand or dirt with a hole in the middle. It is worthwhile to follow the cutter ants and find the hole.

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That's why the pellet-type ant poison work so well. And your pets are not in harm like with the white powder.

After awhile I find the ants avoid the pellet types like Trompa and Patron. Meanwhile I notice my dogs will eat the pellets.

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I like to find the cutter ants holes and pour a liquid ant killer down the holes. Someone explained on this forum that the ants haul the leaves underground and grow a kind of mold on them, which they eat. So Clorox and water down the hole will be effective as well, and cheaper. The holes are recognizable by a pile of sand or dirt with a hole in the middle. It is worthwhile to follow the cutter ants and find the hole.

Someone on this forum once mentioned to put laundry detergent down their holes. I did this about a dozen times but that didn't work.

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When I lived in GA, we had fire ants by the billions. They would create huge mounds so big it was hard to mow the pastures.

We made the same thing as is in those pellets much cheaper.

Take a 5 gallon bucket and fill it 1/4 full of grits (El Torito) Take 4 gallons of hot water, add 1 cup boric acid (any hardware store) and 1 cup of sugar and stir well. Pour into the grits bucket and stir in well and let sit until the grits swell up. (few hours). Dump out on a tarp in the sun and let it dry.

1 cup of grits, a tablespoon of Boric Acid and a tablespoon of sugar should make a quart of the stuff.

It's non toxic. You find Boric Acid in a lot of foods.

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These aren't fire ants here.

Back to the OP. Leaf cutting ants were also stripping my olive tree until I put a band of Tree Tanglefoot around it. Also on my Bauhinia (orchid tree) some insects would cut all the flower buds off at some point. Now with the TT band on it I've had continuous flowers for about 6 months. Tree Tanglefoot has been a godsend. I wish I had found it 20 years ago. And it isn't dangerous chemicals.

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That's the beauty of Trompa. Scatter it along the trail they are using and they will pick it up and take it back to the nest. We have the same problem with our neighbors. We've killed all the ants on both properties.

A pretty big container of Trompa is less than $8 U.S. and it is very easy to use. For best results, go out with a flashlight after dark, find the trail and if possible the hole and scatter a little of it where the ants are.

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I have posted before about formic acid. It is available in Mexico "over the counter", if you speak Spanish. This is actually ant venom, ants do not "bite" but spray the venom. This gives you an idea how difficult this stuff is to work with (laboratory type conditions). It is what specifically attracts cutter ants, they follow a trail of very diluted formic acid blindly. If something like water interrupts the trail, they don't know what to do. The leaves they harvest cannot be digested by these ants, it has to be composted. Formic acid and sticky glue would be considered an organic pest control solution. Gempler's has the bulk sticky stuff:

http://www.gemplers.com/product/147703/Bulk-Rodent-Trap-Glue-1-Gallon

If anybody else wants to go in on developing a cutter ant trail spray, please let me know. It does have commercial potential. Trompa and Hormigal are great - but they do not attract ants and seem to be toxic to pets and organic gardeners.

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About a year ago cutter ants forced me to give up trying to have potted plants in my back patio space. I moved all plants to the front patio where cutter ants have never shown up. I did leave a Crown of Thorns on an unused barbecue though. Last week, I transplanted CofT into a larger pot and (foolishly) moved it to a low ledge by the back door. Saturday morning I went outside and the poor plant had been stripped of all but about 10 leaves. Yesterday morning those were gone.

I now want to move that last plant to the front but have grown paranoid. Will those little b%$#@*ds have left some scent trail on the pot that will announce to every cutter ant in the hood that there is good stuff there?

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Yes - scent trails are the secret vulnerabilty of all ants. I recently read a book which introduced a "circle of death". This was observed in a jungle, somehow the scent trail gets broken, the scouts go out and detect another trail - but this is tail end of the trail they were already on. The ants continue on a circle until they die.

A handy tool for home and garden is one of those "dry" steamers, sometimes called "vapor cleaners". I had a commercial one which I brought down, butit soon broke down. I have a household one now. Anyways, the steam is approx 290F, and contains very little water. It is great for killing weeds, moss, mold and algae. It would also be great for cooking ant colonies. The limitation, of course, is that it is as only long as your extension cord.

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When I lived in GA, we had fire ants by the billions. They would create huge mounds so big it was hard to mow the pastures.

We made the same thing as is in those pellets much cheaper.

Take a 5 gallon bucket and fill it 1/4 full of grits (El Torito) Take 4 gallons of hot water, add 1 cup boric acid (any hardware store) and 1 cup of sugar and stir well. Pour into the grits bucket and stir in well and let sit until the grits swell up. (few hours). Dump out on a tarp in the sun and let it dry.

1 cup of grits, a tablespoon of Boric Acid and a tablespoon of sugar should make a quart of the stuff.

It's non toxic. You find Boric Acid in a lot of foods.

What are grits called in Spanish? And where can I find that in El Torito?

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In our constant fight to stop cutter ants from denuding three olive trees...we were told about a very simple solution:

Wrap a wide sheet of saran wrap, twice around the tree at waist height. Secure with masking tape or painters tape. place an inch wide circle of vaseline around your saran wrap...not too much or it will melt and run off your 'trap."

You will need to renew your saran as it gets full of ants or aphids. I am bringing back "tanglefoot" from the US...which will not run or melt...but the vaseline has stopped the little "bastards" for now.

Does anyone know what the white paint is that's at the bottom of certain trees? Is it to stop cutter ants?

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Grits is ground white corn. They take white corn and put it in a hot alkali solution which pops off the coating. It swells up and this is hominy. If you dry hominy and course grind it that is how grits are made.

Course ground corn meal will probably do the same thing. Grits was always cheaper.

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