![]() A considerable distance to forage and good game plan in the event of danger from natural predators or humans. To put it in perspective, 300 feet is about the size of an American icon as beloved as baseball, the Statue of Liberty. Some tunnels extend well beyond the visible perimeter of the nest, up to 300 feet beyond the mound. Multiple subterranean tunnels snake throughout the cavernous dirt nest just below the earth’s surface, and open to the exterior in random intervals. While many ants will build a single, straight shot up out of their nest Red Imported Fire Ants are more cautious. The all-female worker crews use their nest as a home base, but build foraging tunnels that serve as protected workways for the ants to find food and return it to the queen. Residents of areas infested with RIFA’s soon learn to identify and avoid these dangerous mounds, full of small menaces determined to protect their nest. In the sandy soils of Florida, the nests tend to be wider and flatter. In the clay soil of North Carolina, the mounds might reach a dimension of 12 x 12 inches. ![]() As industrious workers extend the nest to accommodate an ever-growing colony, an excavated dirt mound begins to develop and eventually becomes visible to passers-by. Once the life cycle of an established colony gets going, newly developed workers will first find food, then get to work on the nest. Typical RIFA colonies have only one queen, although research has discovered an increasing number of multiple-queen colonies among this adaptive species. Soon after a newly established queen mates, she will find a sheltered place and take cover to lay eggs. In fact, food is the first imperative for a new colony, shelter is the second. While the queen is responsible for colony reproduction, she has many subjects that provide and care for the immature larvae, build tunnels, protect the colony from invaders, and forage for food. To work together as a colony, different ants are assigned varying tasks creating a caste system. Red Imported Fire Ants are social insects that are all about colony survival, so it’s natural that they would build an extensive nesting zone around the colony to protect the queen. A good exclusion approach to the exterior of the home will help to keep RIFA’s outdoors. ![]() They may also find their way indoors, though this is not their preferred habitat. Red Imported Fire Ants are notoriously bad neighbors, with a bite-sting combo that can ruin an afternoon outside. They invade playing fields, overtake parks and the reproductive alates can even cause a mess in your swimming pool. Red Imported Fire Ants (RIFA) are a headache to homeowners throughout the South, popping up in yards, along sidewalks and even creeping into homes through HVAC systems. You also need broadcast treatments where you’re putting insecticides down to kill workers that are foraging.It’s baseball season in America, and Home Paramount is ready to play ball! As you’re watching your favorite team take the pitcher’s mound, we’re ready to take on another type of mound that isn’t nearly as much fun – the fierce fire ant nest. “Bait alone won’t give you 100 percent control. “Granular baits can be used as an effective baseline control,” says Layton. There are several baseline ways to control the pest using broadcast insecticide treatments - like bifenthrin and fipronil - either in a problem area or directly to the mound and granular bait. Nobody wants to play a ball that landed in a fire ant mound on a fairway.”įire ant control hasn’t changed much in recent years, Layton says. “But really, it’s their unsightliness and the fact that they sting. “Mowing through those mounds can be an issue,” Layton says. While fire ants don’t damage turf, the pest’s mounds can hurt equipment like mowers and be an issue with their aggressive nature. ![]() “So, you can still have a colony even on your green or someplace like the tee box.” “If an area is mowed and disturbed, they’ll just quit heaping that soil up and live down in the soil,” he says.
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