Content

• To step
• Method 1 of 4: Using natural insecticides
• Method 2 of 4: Setting traps
• Method 3 of 4: Exterminate an entire nest
• Method 4 of 4: Natural deterrents
• Tips
• Warnings

If you open your kitchen cupboards and you see a swarm of ants swarming around your spilled sugar, it can be tempting to reach for strong chemicals to get rid of them as quickly as possible. But pesticides are dangerous to people, pets and other harmless critters around your home. The good news is that there are so many effective ways to kill ants without pesticides that there is no need to use chemicals at all. Go to Step 1 to learn how to make ant spray and ant traps, how to remove an entire nest, and how to prevent ants from entering your home, all without pesticides.

To step

Method 1 of 4: Using natural insecticides

1. Use dish soap and water. Fill a bottle with one part dish soap and two parts water and shake well. If you see ants, spray the mixture on them. They immediately suffocate. Wipe up the dead ants with a wet cloth and keep the spray bottle handy for next time.
   • If you place shallow dishes with soapy water you can also kill ants. Lure them there with a hint of something sweet.
   • This method works well if you want to kill a group of ants, but you don't get rid of the entire nest. If the ants keep coming back, you may need to get to the root of the problem.
   • Soapy water is a natural insecticide that kills most insects, not just ants. Try it with cockroaches too.
2. Try white vinegar and water. Ants hate vinegar, and you can make a cheap pesticide from vinegar and water. Mix 1 part vinegar with 1 part water in a spray bottle. Spray directly on the ants to kill them, then wipe up the corpses with a damp paper towel and throw them away.
   • You can also use vinegar with water to deter ants; spray it around your window frames, the doorway and other places where you see them coming in.
   • Some people use this vinegar solution to clean floors, windows and countertops so that ants are less likely to crawl over them. White vinegar is a great cleaning agent, and you won't smell it once it's dry.
3. Make a solution with lemon. If you can't stand the smell of vinegar, spray lemon juice on the ants. They hate the citric acid, so you can also use this as a deterrent if you spray it around your house. Mix 1 part lemon juice with 3 parts water and use it wherever you want.
4. Sprinkle kieselguhr around the house. Kieselguhr is a very effective insecticide that is the least harmful to humans or pets. It consists of skeletons of single-celled diatom or diatoms, ground into powder. When insects walk on the powder, their external skeleton is damaged by the sanding, causing their bodies to dry out. Sprinkle the powder along baseboards, window frames and around your house to kill ants.
   • Put on a mask or hold a cloth in front of your face when working with kieselguhr. The powder is not harmful if you ingest it, but the small particles are not good for your lungs when you breathe it in.
   • Kieselguhr stops working when it gets wet or when the air is humid. It regains its effect when it dries up, so if your house is too humid, use a dehumidifier.
5. Use boric acid. This is completely natural and works very well against ants. When they eat boric acid, they poison their stomach and die. Boric acid also damages the external skeleton, as does diatomaceous earth. You buy it as a white or blue powder that you should sprinkle on the places where there are many ants.
   • Boric acid is not a toxic pesticide, but it should not be eaten by humans or pets. Do not use it where your children or pets play. Also, don't use it near food, such as in your kitchen cupboards.
   • Boric acid is not toxic to beneficial insects, birds, reptiles or fish.

Method 2 of 4: Setting traps

1. Trap boric acid and sugar. This is easy to make, cheap and very effective. All you need is a few pieces of cardboard, a bottle of syrup and boric acid. Here's how to make the trap:
   • In a small bowl, mix 2 tablespoons of syrup with 2 tablespoons of boric acid.
   • Make sure it becomes a paste, sticky and not too thin. Add more boric acid if it is too wet.
   • Divide the mixture over a piece of cardboard with a spoon. Every piece of cardboard becomes a trap.
2. Place the traps where you see ants. If they like to walk in your bathroom, put one there. Put one under the counter and one on your patio. Place them wherever there are many ants.
   • Because the traps contain boric acid, don't put them in your kitchen cupboards or with food.
   • You can also set traps outside. Put them in flower beds or near the trash can.
   • The sweets can also attract other creatures, such as your child or your dog. Make sure they can't get to it.
3. Wait for the trap to attract ants. If you have an infestation, it won't be long before the trap is full of ants crawling up the cardboard in search of sweets and eating the boric acid. They won't die right away, but if the poison gets into their stomach, they will. In the meantime, they also bring it to their nest, which also poisons their fellow ants.
   • If you see ants moving in and out of the trap, just let them do their thing. If you kill them right away, they won't take it to their nest.
   • This method will not eradicate the entire nest, but it will drastically reduce the population in and around your home.
4. Replace the traps when the syrup dries. After a few days you may have to make new traps. Mix another fresh portion of ant venom, spread it on cardboard and set the traps.
5. Keep using these traps until no more ants are coming. After a week or two, fewer ants will come to the traps. If you find dead ants around your house and they stop walking into your house, the work is done.
6. Use cornmeal with boric acid to kill the larvae. Worker ants will eat liquids, not solid foods, but they will take kernels of cornmeal back to their nests. They give it to the larvae, which digest it into a liquid and return it for the worker ants to eat. In this way, the boric acid works to kill several generations.
   • Make sure to put down bowls of cornmeal with boric acid that are low enough for the ants to climb in and out.
   • You can also make a dry paste with cornmeal, boric acid, and a few drops of water. Spread the paste in places where you see a lot of ants.

Method 3 of 4: Exterminate an entire nest

1. Follow the ants to the nest. If ants still come into your home despite all the traps and sprays, you may need to address the source - the nest. When you see a line of ants marching in, follow them back as far as possible until you reach the ants nest. Depending on the species you are dealing with, it can be underground, between rocks or in your house.
   • The garden ant is the best known kind. The name "garden ant" is a collective name for road ants, tree ants, shiny carpenter ants and shadow ants. The garden ant is black in color and between 3 mm and 4 mm long. The ants have wings but don't fly much. Garden ants eat insects and sweets. They mainly live in outdoor environments. The glossy carpenter ant often has its nest in rotting wood, underground.
   • The black seed ant. The black seed ant is about 2 to 3 mm long. Striking about the black sperm ant is the shape of the body: it seems as if there are many buttons in the ant's body from the head to the butt. Black seed ants are exceptionally found in buildings. They do, however, occasionally nest under buildings. The nests can grow into massive ant colonies with up to 80,000 workers. The black seed ant eats insects, plants and fats and can sting and bite.
   • The pharaoh ant. The pharaoh ant is a small ant species whose workers only grow to 2 to 3 mm long. Pharaoh ants like heat and like to build their nests near heat sources indoors. Pharaoh ants eat everything but prefer cold cuts.
   • The common stinging ant Common sting ants are reddish brown and have a dark head and abdomen. The workers are approximately 3.5 to 5 mm long. Common stinging ants are found in damp places in meadows, fields and forests. They are rare indoors. Common stinging ants can bite fiercely.
2. Prepare a kettle of boiling water. Fill a large kettle halfway with water. Bring it to a boil over high heat. Once it boils, take the kettle to the nest as soon as possible.
3. Pour the water over the nest. Try to pour the water into every entrance you see. The boiling water can kill hundreds of ants, and it also causes the nest to collapse. If the nest is very large, you may need to pour in more than one kettle.
   • If the nest you are dealing with is indoors, the boiling water may be able to cause damage. Then rather use soapy water. You can also put on a pair of rubber gloves and scoop the entire nest into a bucket, then pour boiling water on top.
   • If you're dealing with stabbing ants, put on long sleeves and long pants that you tuck into your socks. The ants will certainly get very angry, and can get into your clothes.
4. After a few days, look at the nest again. If the boiling water has been effective, the ant infestation should be over. When you see a small line of ants coming back, pour boiling water over the nest again. Sometimes you have to pour more than once to kill all the ants.
   • If the boiling water doesn't seem to work, take a stick and put it in the nest. Wiggle it back and forth until you have a large crater. Fill the crater with baking soda and pour vinegar over it.
   • If you're dealing with stabbing ants, you can also scoop out the entire nest. Put your pants in your socks for protection, take a shovel and scoop the entire anthill into a large bucket sprinkled with baking soda to keep the ants from climbing out. Keep going until the entire nest has been scooped out. Then pour boiling water or vinegar into the bucket.
5. Stop the entrances if you can't get to the nest. Sometimes it is difficult to get to the entire nest, but usually you will find an entrance. You can pour water into the entrance, but often it is just as effective to plug the hole. Put sand or stones in it and sprinkle some boric acid around the area. The ants will probably make their nests elsewhere.

Method 4 of 4: Natural deterrents

1. Make a line that ants don't cross. There are several natural remedies that ants hate so much that they don't want to get over them. If you use one of these fabrics to draw a line along your window frames, or in certain areas in and around your house, you can stop the ants from getting there. Refresh the line every few days, because if the line is broken, the ants will go in between. Here are some resources that can work for that:
   • Cinnamon
   • Cayenne pepper
   • Grated orange and lemon zest.
   • Coffee grounds
2. Squeeze lemon juice around the outside edges. This will keep your house from getting sticky indoors, but the strong citrus scent will deter the ants. You can also make a solution of half lemon juice and half water.
3. Use essential oil to keep ants at bay. They hate the scent of different kinds of essential oils, which actually smell good to people. Put 10 drops of the essential oil in 250 ml of water, and spray the solution both inside and out to keep ants away. Here are types of oil you can try:
   • Lemon oil
   • Peppermint Oil
   • Eucalyptus Oil (Do not use this if you have a cat! It is toxic for cats, not for dogs)
   • Lavender oil
   • Cedar oil
4. Keep everything clean so that ants do not want to enter. Most ants want to come in during the spring, so keep floors, countertops and cupboards spotless. This is a great help to keep ants out. If they don't smell food, they won't want to enter your house.
   • Keep storage containers tightly closed. This is especially important for sugar, honey, syrup and other things that ants like to eat.
   • Clean up immediately if you have spilled anything, especially fruit juice or syrup.
5. Close any cracks to keep them out. If ants cannot enter easily, they are more likely to stay outside. Look for any cracks and holes they can enter, such as under the door, along window frames, and through other cracks. Fill the cracks with sealant or other insulation to keep your house tight. Spray lavender oil or lemon water around it to be on the safe side.

Tips

• Always check doorways and window sills; one ant can quickly lead to thousands of ants.Ants leave an invisible scent trail that can only be smelled by other ants. So use cleaning products specifically aimed at ants to remove this trail.
• You can squeeze some lemon juice into a pan of boiling water and pour it over the anthill.
• Ants don't like peppermint toothpaste. Smear this where you see them and you will see them disappear.
• If you can't afford to kill the ants, leave a jar of honey in a tree in the garden at the beginning of summer. The ants will be happy to leave your kitchen alone.
• The best way to keep ants out is to keep your home clean. Wipe countertops regularly and do not leave crumbs.
• Make a mixture of dish soap, vinegar and other cleaning products and spray it on the ants. Always works!
• Arm yourself with tape. If you see an ant, stick a piece of tape on it and squash it underneath. The ant body is then stuck to the tape, so you can easily clean it up. Repeat until the tape is no longer sticky.
• Crush ants with your fingers. Then wash your hands well, because ants can stink.
• It is said that you can put up a barrier of lime or salt against ants, but many people find that it does not work well.

Warnings

• The ants will come back over time; so be prepared to repeat everything again.
• Keep ant traps and poison away from children and pets. Place them in places where only ants can get.
• Remember, ants are an important part of the food chain. So don't try to kill all the ants in your area, only the ants in your house.