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Ants

Ant Identification Guide

What are ants?

Ants are social insects, with each species looking or behaving differently from the next. Ants do share some physical characteristics, including three body segments, a narrow waist between the abdomen and thorax, elbowed antennae, and powerful chewing mouthparts. Ants belong to the same order as bees and wasps, which are also social insects.

Ants are small in size, so the only way they can survive and be successful is to work together as a group. Each member of the colony is either a queen, male, or worker. Worker ants do the bulk of the work required to maintain a colony, queens produce new ants, and the male's only job is to mate with the queen. A single ant colony can have thousands upon thousands of members and multiple nesting sites. An ant colony that has set its sites on your property is difficult to eliminate without a professional's help.

Three of the most common ants our pest professionals deal with regularly include carpenter ants, pavement ants, odorous house ants, and pharaoh ants.

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    Why Do I Have an Ant Problem?

    Ants produce chemicals called pheromones to communicate with each other. Once a worker ant discovers a source of food, it will create a chemical trail that alerts other colony members. Pheromone trails are why you often see ants traveling together in long lines. The ant's diet varies, but most eat plants, seeds, proteins, small insects, nectar, and honeydew. Food in our gardens, trash cans, and pet bowls is highly attractive to ants and often initially attracts these intruders to our properties. Once foraging for food next to our homes, it is common for them to move inside through cracks and crevices they discover.

    Common Locations to Find Ants in Your Home

    Ants nesting outside usually place their nests in the ground under leaf litter, fallen trees, tree stumps, woodpiles, or lawns. As their name tells us, pavement ants prefer to nest in the soil of cracks found in pavement, sidewalks, and driveways. They also nest next to the soil around foundations. After meandering into our homes searching for food or areas to build a nest, homeowners often seeing ants walking around the kitchen, bathroom, or basement floors. They also crawl across counters and along walls moving back and forth from their nest to food source. Most ants like to place their nests in warm, damp locations like masonry walls and wall voids near water pipes, sinks, and heating units. 

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