Sintria, GREAT photo's! I can see that (slug type) critter would be a muncher for sure. I wish I was able to identify bugs better, I will often to google image searches when I see strange guys in the garden. Problem with killing them outright without knowing what they are is, many will do some limited damage as youths, but transform into the benificial garden helpers as adults. So, I really hesitate to do anything about bugs eating SOME plants unless they are going to wipe everything out, I hate boarers though and earwigs drive me insane:( Often too, the more "bad" bugs you get, the more preditors you attract. If there's little or no food source for the preds, like wasps etc, they just won't come to the garden and take a good chomp out the few that we do get (but the few that could eat the whole garden up) I "attempt" to work with nature when ever possible, and when it's starts to get me angry, I pull out my water gun and shoot me some bugs with soap and water, man that can feel GOOD (sort of ashamed to admit it:) I think you folks in the warmer climates have a lot more to deal with pest wise, then those of us in the colder climates with the harsher winters. I'm in Ottawa Canada. For the most part, I have made peace with bugs, so long as they only take a leaf or two. I had chunks taken out of my tomato's last year too and THAT I was cranky about, left with only half of each tomato for me! Now, squirrels are a different story, they are digging all over the place and not even looking to EAT the plants they distroy/dig up as they look for seeds and nuts, ARG!

Hi Rick. Yes, the pots have always been up off the ground. My husband built me a bench off the fence just for my seedlings. I've just recently found an old security screen to put them on for added air flow. I think I'm going to have to re pot them and get rid of the old dirt.... I didn't want to re pot them so soon :-( Hopefully having them up on the mesh will help stop them coming back. Sam

The fire ants are small ants. If they are small, red and in Florida, then I think it is safe to say they are fire ants. I think carpenter ants can be red, also, but are larger than fire ants. If you have both red and black ants, I would use both terro and amdro. They are baits so you won't see results instantly. And initially, it will attract more ants. The workers have to carry the bait back to the nest and feed it to the queen in order to eliminate the colony. The bait kills the workers and the queens who ingest it but it takes a day or 2 to see results. Sevin won't kill the queen unless you find the colony's nest and dust/spray the nest.

And then there's Fireants... the ant that will hurt you first given half a chance. A rancher friend had a couple large pecan trees topple from a storm. We found that fireants had completely destroyed the root system in each tree. So we treated his grove with nematodes and watched the dead ants pile up under the trees. Twenty years later the rest of the pecans are still standing. In my own yard I have a couple mesquite trees that have a couple large dead limbs. I've been putting off cutting them down since I know there will be fireant nests in them. You need a very fast chainsaw to get the job done before they get you. And believe me, they want to get you. I hate fireants with a passion, but will let most other ants be as long as they stay outside. Then there's the leaf cutters... This post was edited by mecdave on Thu, Oct 30, 14 at 8:21