The fire ant mounds are closing in on my citrus. What should I do? I am worried the baits may poison plants like citrus. Anything effective to eliminate them without damaging my vegtables and citrus.

Bait is the only way to get rid of fire ants. Poisons just make them move.

I'd recommend Amdro. While it's not labeled for use directly under your tree, it is labeled for use in the rest of your yard. It is not very toxic, and it breaks down in the environment very quickly (half life of about 24 hours after application). It's also very effective if used correctly. Use it on a warm, dry day. If it gets wet or if it's too cold, it won't work (the ants won't eat it). Also, don't stir up the ants in the application process. You want them to find it on their own, with no sense of alarm, and carry this wonderful new "food source" back to their colony and feed it to mom and all the kids before any of them suspects there's a problem.

There are several other baits that work similarly -- Logic, Clinch, etc. Anything that is a slow-acting bait, based on soy oil in corn grits, should work equally well. The "fast-acting" materials don't work. They give a quick kill of ants that come in contact with them, but they usually fail to get to the colony queen.

Malcolm

I have had excellent control of fire ants using DuPont Advion.

I've never tried Advion, but in reading its label, it sounds like exactly what is needed -- a bait that does not result in any symptoms until the ants have distributed it throughout the colony. And they do caution the user not to rile up the ants, so I like their philosophy!

I had a fire ant mond in the soil around my potted valencia orange tree. I stuck my hand in the mound not knowing it was there and have stings all over my hand! When they get distrubed they move so fast and are extremely vicious!

They can be really bad on little kids. I have seen kids with hundreds of bites--they turn into sores because the kids won't stop scratching. I have heard of small kids being hospitalized. They are just a part of life here--you can't ever get rid of them for good--they swarm into thunderstorms, mate, and then they come down in the rain to start a new mound.

Bleach will kill a lot of the ants and make them move if you want something that does not leave a toxic residue.

I discovered many more ant mounds after a recent rain event.


Is permethrin nonsystemic and safe to use near fruit bearing citrus?

Permethrins are derived from chrysanthemum flowers, there are some that are synthesized and some that are totally natural, they are about as safe as you can get as far as insecticides. All of the ones I am aware of have pretty low mamalian toxicity and they break down pretty fast. They are commonly used around here for lawn pest (including fire ants) as a granular material applied with a lawn spreader.

Some of the synthetic forms have very high toxicity to some aquatic organisms like shrimp--some will kill shrimp at levels as low as 6 parts per trillion, so hopefully you do not live near the water.