Tips to Quickly Identify an Ant Infestation

If you find a few ants here and there around your home, it’s not necessarily a big deal. Sometimes ants get inside the home and spend some time trying to find food to forage for. However, it’s when you have ant colonies actually forming within the walls of your home that you need to be truly concerned.

Here are a few ways you can determine if you have ants living inside your walls. We recommend calling an ant control specialist in Butte County, CA if you believe this to be the case:

• Ant type: Are the ants carpenter ants? If so, this is a sign that they may be living in your walls, because carpenter ants prefer to live around wood (especially rotten or damp wood). Carpenter ants are large and typically black, but can occasionally have a reddish tint. If you have any rotten wood around your house, there’s a pretty decent chance carpenter ants have set up shop in it.
• Listen: Put your ear right up next to your walls or floors. You may be able to hear insect activity if there is a colony inside the area. This is an obvious sign that you need to call an exterminator.
• Look for rot: If you have any wood rotting on the exterior of your home, then this could be a place where ants are able to get into your house. Spend some time looking at any areas where you have broken gutters or where rainwater can collect next to your house. This is the most likely place for there to be problems with rot.
• Get an inspection: The most reliable way to determine whether or not you have an ant infestation in your home is to hire a professional to come out and perform an inspection. Only then can you truly be certain you’re dealing with an ant problem that needs to be professionally resolved.

Dealing with foragers

As previously mentioned, not every ant that comes into your home is a sign of an infestation. Sometimes they’re ants that live outside that are looking for food and decide to venture inside your home. So how do you deal with those pests?

The best thing you can do is focus on keeping your home clean. If food spills on the ground, clean it up right away. Put any food in cabinets in sealed plastic containers so that the ants can’t get at them. If they’re going after dishes of pet food, only put the dish down on the floor during meal times, and consider spraying a little bit of a vinegar/water mixture around the bowl.

If you see a trail of ants, you should spray the entire trail with a window or glass cleaner, a mixture of soap and water or the vinegar/water mixture mentioned above. This will get rid of the scent trail the ants leave behind to allow others to follow after them. If you notice entry points around your home, use a caulking gun to seal them up so they can’t keep getting in.

For more information about how to handle a potential ant infestation in your home, contact Hobbs Pest Solutions. Our ant control specialists in Butte County, CA would be happy to answer any questions you have!

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