Photo courtesy of Scorchez at Flickr.com.

Ants are tenacious little creatures, and they can make a meal out of the things that we throw out. Unfortunately, that means that ants love to turn compost bins into buffet lines. That’s not such a terrible thing if you’re trying to return food scraps to the earth, but ants can be a real nuisance (destroying electrical equipment, eating through insulation, and even eating worms in your composter). Here are a few tips on how to control ants around your composter.

If the ants are coming from outside and foraging in the container, then I would suggest isolating it from the outside. You may need to find a new place for the container, preferably one where there are no cracks to the outside or somewhere that the container is physically isolated from the ground (ie; on a plastic sheet or shelf).

Start by moving the container. Ants rely on scent trails to find their way, so when you move it, no new ants will show up for a while. I would suggest moving your composter twice - once so that no new ants find their way inside, and again after all the residual ants have left. If you only move the container once, the departing ants may be able to lay new scent trails which will undo your hard work.

Depending on the type of ants, it should take between 10 and 30 minutes for all the ants to leave. You might be able to speed up the process by putting a repellent in the container. If your composter uses worms, then make sure you use a worm safe repellent.

Before you move the container to its new location, it would be a good idea to eliminate whatever attracted the ants in the first place. Scrubbing the bottom of the container with soapy water should eliminate any spilled material and it will also wash away the ant scent markers. In extreme cases (for example, on island communities where ants are particularly persistent) you may want to use a physical barrier that the ants can’t cross. You could put the legs of the composter in bowls of water or organic ant repellent.

Another solution is to spread diatomaceous earth around the base of the composter. DE will kill any foraging ants and prevent them from bringing in reinforcements. It also works against other pests, such as silverfish, cockroaches, and slugs. The type of diatomaceous earth you use is important - some varieties are chemically treated and heated in ways that make them unsafe to use indoors, so make sure you check for a type that’s safe to have around the house. Ground Cayenne Pepper also works against some ants.

If the ants are coming from inside the container, it can be trickier to get them out. After ants have built a nest, the easiest way to deal with the problem is usually to empty the contents outside (in a compost pile) and start over. If that’s not an option, here are some other ant control methods that we recommend.

Send those ants packing!

Photo courtesy of Photo Plus 1 (Kamran Ahmed) at Flickr.com.

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This entry was posted on Monday, July 14th, 2008 at 5:00 am and is filed under Gardening Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.