Milton's October Surprise.
 

I started cleaning up the front yard of storm debris like tree branches, leaves and the like. This also included what looked like a bird or maybe a squirrel nest. The nest had fallen from about fifteen feet from the Oak Tree.


I eventually got to what was the nest in the ground and pulled up some of its outer layer hoping that no squirrel nor bird young had been in it. But looking closely the whole thing seemed to be shifting in appearance. It seemed like it was alive. And then I saw the it was covered with hundreds of ants moving in every direction with a few trailing onto the ground.

It turned out my frequent battle with white footed ants had come back yet again after having had Massey spray these invasive species.


They had just moved over instead of out. And then the winds of Milton took them down.

People should be on the lookout for white footed ants as they are quite difficult to get rid of and seem rather new Villagers.

Wrong Pesticide
 

Perhaps they sprayed a watered down product or they didn’t know what they were doing. Sounds like a Termidor SC or something similar should have been used. The product doesn’t kill immediately and service ants carry it back to their nesting areas. It eventually takes out the entire colony.

These ants are new to the area and have multiple colonies with multiple queens.

Never heard of white footed ants but Termidor SC is supposed to be effective against all ants. I don't think the number of colonies and queens will matter. I had carpenter ants up in Minnesota and it worked excellent against them. It also works against termites. It's good stuff.

I spray my house twice a year with Termidor SC and twice a year with talspar P, alternating the two.

Here's a link to everything you'd need to know about white-footed ants, and how to control them.

white-footed ant - Technomyrmex difficilis Forel

Figure 5 is how they looked around our house. Trails here and there. Massey did spray but these ants are very persistent.


I did not see any dead birds nor squirrels in the bird or squirrel nest but do see a lot of very contented lizards.

A BIG Thank You for this info. I never heard of them before. Also be on the lookout for many things that fly in and land in our yards with these storms.

We have always come across a lot more bees, spiders, etc when picking up debris after a hurricane.
I got stung by many yellow jackets just by stepping on their hive(?) after a hurricane.
Many could not have fared as well as I did, so be suspecting of odd things that were not there before the wind blew.

Kinda interesting
 

"The WFA {white-footed ant] does not bite or sting, nor has it been reported to cause any structural damage. Colony population estimates vary from 8,000 to 3 million individuals (Tsuji and Yamauchi 1994). WFAs are considered by homeowners to be a nuisance pest because they are frequently observed foraging in kitchens, bathrooms, and the exterior of buildings." From white-footed ant - Technomyrmex difficilis Forel

There could have been 8,000 ants in the squirrel's nest. It was full of them . And I wiped out a colony in the garage that was about an "18 inch circle but which had a lot of outliers. Water diluted vinegar sprayed out of a bottle and the use of a push broom killed them. There could have been 8,000 of these in the garage . Massey got another colony in a nearby bush.

Free amino acids
 

So, lots of protein available in a confined area? :-)

Ants
 

They moved over because they are super intelligent creatures.

Why would you want to get rid of them if they are outside; they don’t bite or sting!

Nest of ants
 

Now we ant lovers

They have to eat and multiple very quickly. You could have 3 million of them all over your house in time.