Carpenter Ants: A Checklist for You and Your Pest Control Pro

A house is indeed a home for a carpenter ant. As their name implies, carpenter ants live inside wood.

Among the largest species of ants in North America, these pests hollow out the structural wood of your home to build well-crafted nests inside. They don’t actually eat wood like termites, so when carpenter ants aren’t tunneling inside your walls, they’re out foraging for food in your kitchen and the rest of the home — usually at night.

Certain conditions in the home attract carpenter ant infestations, such as pockets of moisture and/or wood that’s deteriorated from age or rot. Colonies of ants often reside in exterior sources of wood in your yard and landscape such as trees and hollow logs, landscaping timbers and scrap wood.

Homeowners can reduce the likelihood of infestation by taking a few steps:

• Replace segments of damp or rotting wood in the home.
• Fix plumbing leaks promptly and replace any water-logged wood.
• Ventilate the crawl space and attic well to eliminate moisture.
• Keep scrap wood, stumps and logs away from the house and store firewood at a distance.
• Trim back tree limbs or shrubs that contact the house.

When carpenter ants are confirmed inside the home, a pest control professional will employ several strategies to eliminate the colonies.

• Locate the nest using techniques including small access holes into wall voids and wooden structures. Visual examination of attics and crawl spaces is required and  listening devices may even be used to detect the sound of large hidden colonies. After-dark inspections may help catch nighttime food foragers.
• Treat the nest with residual insecticides in either spray or powdered form. Effective insecticides include chlorfenapyr and fipronil, as well as many of the varieties of pyrethroids. Baits may be used to induce foraging ants to carry insecticides back to the colony.
• Suggest areas in need of wood treatments and/or removal of rotted wood to prevent re-infestation.

Haggerty Pest Service has helped keep South Florida homeowners pest-free since 1985. Ask us about professional treatments to evict carpenter ants from your home and keep them from coming back.

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