Ants With Wings

Ants with wings swarming the woodlands in warm summer night leave people wondering. What are these insects? Is an exterminator needed? Many questions for such little insects. But fear not and keep reading.

Ant colonies are established by their queen. She is one of the many ants with wings who start out on their own, and once she is fertilized and ready to start an ant colony, she looks for the perfect spot. Preferably wood, dump and moist, such as tree stumps and hollowed tree trunks. However, very few queen ants make it this far.

You wonder why.

Once in a while, after a few days of rain, large amounts of winged ants swarm out of their nests. These are male and female ants, ready to reproduce. They fly around looking for partners to mate with, frequently congregating to elevated locations – a phenomenon known as hill-toping – nearby hills, even mounds, tall trees, lampposts.

It only takes a day. Male ants will spread out around the nest as they are lighter and move around easier than the female ants. With heavier and larger bodies, the females will launch from the grass or a twig. The female ant will fly towards a male ant guiding herself after the attractive odor he emits. Although of no use to ant workers because they do not mate, wings play a crucial role in the mating ritual of ants. After successfully mating, the male ants die while the female ants with wings go on to try and establish a colony. Most of them are not going to make it.

After the mating ritual, working ants from the initial colony will clean up the dead male ants and the leftovers from the fertilized ant queens.

Carpenter Ants With Wings

Swarming, mating ants with wings are nothing to be worry about. True, it is a whole lot of them, but they will disperse as soon as they are finished with the ritual. Pest control agencies and exterminators need not be involved.

However, you don’t want to see any kind of ants in house. It is likely they will try and establish a colony inside, or even worse, there is already an ant colony in the house. Pharaoh and carpenter ants usually do that. You might need to have the house treated by a professional.

If other type of mating ants with wings, such as the field ants, end up crawling inside the house, there is nothing to worry about – they will not colonize the premises. They are outdoor creatures.

The most common kind of ants with wings widely seen in the United States in the month of March will be carpenter ants.

It’s about the end of September and beginning of October, it starts getting cold so we want to be putting a barrier down against ants in my house. We try to keep these fall invader insects from coming inside so we are going to take a walk around the house and we are going to think like an insect, think like an ant, think like a spider, think like a ladybug. How can we get inside where all the good food is? This is called observation.

When you have ants you can see them on side of the house making trails in the area right up against the foundation of your house. Every window of the house is a way for crawling insects to come in, so we should treat around the lower windows (those on the ground floor, closer to the ground), treat all around the foundation all the way around the house.

Check your downspouts and make sure they are not leaking or falling off, give them a bit of a shakedown. A lot of time ants and insects if they find water at the bottom that is a good way to attract them. Review the drier vents – sometimes they are cracked or open – make sure they are well sealed up.

Photo courtesy of ciamabue

Any time you have growing right up against your house foundation is like making a highway for ants in my house and various types of bugs. Get a rake and clean all the grass and weed thoroughly.

For the air conditioning unit check out the little water drain coming out through the pipe in the wall dripping water on the outside. That is like a watering hole for the local ants and insects.

After walking around the house and observing what is going on from the insects’ perspective, it’s time to put up the barriers.
Use a granular contact insecticide that comes in a plastic bag. Cut open the bag at one end then walk around the house spreading it all over, particularly at those trouble points you noticed earlier (water dripping spots, drains, under windows). That will make it much more difficult for ants in my house to get in.

Afterwards take an aerosol can insecticide and spray in hard to reach spots – right around the windows, every nook and cranny, all corners and crevices. Treat it well all the edges because bugs and ants really love edges.

Ants in my house – what to do now?

Most of time when you begin noticing ants in my house they will be crawling up through corners or edges, by the window still and other places around the house. Make sure there is nothing to eat for them left outside, and that all food is covered. If you don’t have time to pack things up or there are still leftovers, use some ant bait trap. Set it close to the window where ants come in.

Another way is getting all the lower areas sprayed, down under the cupboards near the floor where you find the ants. Spray the window seals as well.

It takes a while to get rid of the ants in my house therefore make sure you wipe and rinse off the dishes, have everything is set away and cleaned up so that the exterminator can take its time.