LSU Ag Center shares best ways to get rid of fire ants in your garden

Keymonte Avery
·2 min read

BATON ROUGE, La. (BRPROUD) — Tired of those pesky red fire ants ruining your lawn with their mounds? The LSU Ag Center has shared ways to deal with them safely.

Red fire ants are known for their painful bites, venomous stings and huge ant mounds. Deep inside the mounds are colonies, which can hold up to 200,000 ants and a queen ant laying almost 1,600 eggs daily. The LSU Ag Center said these fire ants make many tunnels underground. It can take months for the mound to become visible.

Fire ants predominantly only come out in the warmer spring and summer months as the ground dries.

Methods for Getting Rid of Fire Ants

According to the LSU Ag Center, using some ant baits can potentially harm birds. Baits containing organophosphate and carbamate insecticides can cause respiratory failure or even death in birds.

The Ag Center suggests using insect growth regulators (IGRs). They stop ant eggs from becoming adults.

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Diatomaceous earth is an organic powder. It can be used as a perimeter treatment to control ants. Other organic options are insecticides with boric acid, pyrethrin or rotenone labeled for ant control, according to LSU.

You can pour boiling water. But, you will need a second pour days later. One pour rarely reaches the entire mound, LSU said.

Retired Ag Center entomologist Dale Pollet recommends using baits. He suggests applying the bait while there are a couple of dry days to ensure the bait doesn’t get washed away. Some baits are made of an insecticide and food material combination that fire ants eat.

Dust with acephate will work on mounds. LSU said it can pass through the colony and kill the ants within days.

Mound drenches are a liquid removal. They can kill pests within a day if the ground is dry, according to the Ag Center.

Granules can be sprinkled on top of the mound without disturbing the colony. The Ag Center stresses penetrating the whole mound. This ensures the colony doesn’t move.

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Debunking the Myths

The LSU Ag Center said spreading grits across the mound will not work, as it is only feeding the ants.

Placing a shovel into one mound and attempting to make the colonies battle also is a myth. The Ag Center said some mounds are of the same colony. Colonies can spread up to 25 feet.

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