I remember the fire ant marching North :( I was hoping that our weather would be too cold for them. Over the years that marched up this way, we where in a heat wave w/ a droughts in the summer, now I wonder how cold is too cold for the fire ants, how much more will they go north. I know the site said they are not sure how they got in Huston or where they came from... But one has to wonder, if someone didnt "plant" the little guys on our soil, hoping to kill the fire ants, but not knowing full of what the crazy ants would do. and how does a African queens escape from an South American lab (AKA; Killer bees) furthermore, why does it always seem that when I Insect gets loose, it has to be a nasty one. what happened to all the good Insects. the site, it also said that they kill out electrical meaning they also invade inside your home, and wipe out our ladybugs. But what I don't understand is that it looks like they could have been control, and still could, if the EPA would allow a stronger ant killer to be available to the Exterminators. for me it leaves too many questions and not enough answers. Like if they knew about the ants since 2002, why have they not done something about it.. If an exterminator is charging someone $1200 to kill out the ants at her parents home ( if that is true, and it really does kill the ants) then there you go..

I have similar problems with killing fire ants in my containers. None of the home remedies worked for me. Amdro probably would not be bad since it is a bait but can take up to three weeks to kill the mound. That would allow too much time for the ants to do damage. The last thing I used was Sevin. Yes, many people do not like it but it has been around a long time and is approved for gardens. I just sprinkled it around the mound in the container and also where they were coming into the container (it was on the ground). It seems to have killed the entire mound. I watered a couple of days later and no ants came out. Spinosad would work but is hard to find and more expensive than sevin. I had quit using sevin since it is so hard on bees and I have ingested enough when I use to use it on dogs. Does not work good on ticks but at the time was about all there was. It was before the various skin spot treatments came out. When I dusted the dogs, me and the dogs got covered. Never had any side effects but still not good. Dusting on the mound seems much safer.

Thanks, Carolina...I wasn't worried about the oils but the benzocaine. Glad to know that it can be used on little ones. aok, Amdro is what I've recommended for many years. Just be sure to read and follow the directions carefully....do not disturb the nest at all or the darned things will simply pack up and move to a different location. That's all that boiling water will do, too. Fire ant nests are far too expansive to be much affected by a stream of boiling water. The workers will gather the poison laced Amdro particles, taking them into the nesting chambers where they are eventually fed to the larvae, all other members of the colony, and the queen. You can literally watch the ants come after the sprinkles immediately. Do not use Amdro on a veggie garden, though. There are organic baits for that. Yes, they bite and sting! They latch on with their jaws before winding up to deliver venom-loaded stings. They can sting more than once from the same bite hold.

Try this ancient and completely non poisonous approach on the fire ants (mounds or anyplace you see them coming from). I found this back in the 70s in an old Farmer's Almanac from the library. Mix 3 tablespoons of molasses or sugar in a gallon of water. Mix a teaspoon or packet of any yeast in a few tablespoons of warm water for 20 minutes. Pour the yeast into sugar water and then pour it all into the mound. If a gallon isn't enough make more. Pour it a foot or two around the mound to discourage them from moving. Why might this work? Because fire ants hate sugar and all ants hate yeast. It has to do with what they are doing underground. The sugar and yeast ruin their food storage. They should abandon the mound in 24 hours, but look around to see if they just moved. Having said all that, if they are not making mounds after it rains, then they might not be fire ants. Lots of ants will bite. Still, that sugar/yeast mix works on a lot of different ants.