Martha from Porterville, Calif. writes
I have extremely small -1/16" bright orange-red ants that suddenly appeared in quite a large number outside the raised foundation of my home in the foothills of central Calif. Nothing indoors but they had a wide trail from a potted plant (now gone) running right against the foundation to the corner of the house, then they lead away in a trail about one foot wide into the yard, which is bare decomposed granite and dry clay soil. I immediately ran for the 3 gal sprayer and mixed a batch of my go-to scorpion killer, Fastcap, and sprayed until all were thoroughly saturated. I came back about 30 min later and saw ants coming out of the ground everywhere. I had previously sprayed some ground wasp holes and the ants seem to be oblivious to the wasps, but I wonder if they might be using the old holes as ant nests? And if they're in the ground how deep do they tunnel?
It is possible that another insect such as ants could occupy the space or nest left empty by another insect, especially if it is a cool underground spot. If you are going to treat what looks like a nesting area with a product like Onslaught FastCap, then I would treat the area like a fire ant mound. We have a video on this treatment in our Fire Ant Treatment Guide online here (Method 2).
Answer last updated on: 08/06/2018
