Wednesday, June 06, 2007

Is there an entomologist in the house?

Despite having a cockroach as an occasional coblogger, I know very little about insects. So I need your help in identifying the pesky pests that staged a large-scale invasion of my house yesterday. Do you know what these are? How do I get rid of them and discourage them from returning?



9 comments:

LizardBreath said...

Ants -- they have wings when they're mating and founding new nests. Like so.

Anonymous said...

They look to me like the exotic and dangerous Ant. The net is full of ant remedies, but I've always gone fully chemical: find the hole or holes they're coming from, Raid the bejesus out of said holes, then set little ant traps along the paths the ants took from the holes to their booty (i.e., your larder). That seems to take care of the problem. If you don't want to go chemical, you'll just have to squish them, one by one--tough for a Buddhist, I know, but life is hard.

My Alter Ego said...

you'll just have to squish them, one by one--tough for a Buddhist, I know

Luckily I'm one of the "no qualms about squishing tiny insects, especially those that have thoroughly wrecked their karma by having the unmitigated gall to enter my house" kind of Buddhists, so no problem there. I probably hand-squished upwards of fifty of them last night.

Funny thing is, we just had the house sprayed for ants a few months ago. Time to call the exterminators back, I guess.

My Alter Ego said...

By the way, thanks to you both for your identification of these buggers as ants. I can deal with ants. What I was really afraid of was that some expert would tell me they were termites.

Anonymous said...

Definitely ants.

Anonymous said...

Ants have wings now? What's next, opposable thumbs?

Megan said...

If you can find where they're coming in, you can surround it cinnamon. They won't cross a line of cinnamon. I've kept them out of the house with bulk cinnamon and kept my hippie karma clean and then really wanted cinnamon rolls.

LizardBreath said...

Dish soap also works for that, albeit probably less mercifully. If you find their points of entry, and wall them off with a dribble of dishwashing detergent, they won't cross it.

midnightexpress said...

I don't know where those buggers are coming from!! What do I do when I can't find the source?!?