Ants Marching
In the bee yard, there is one thing that frustrates me to no end and that is ants. I hate going to the hives to feed and finding ants in the feeder. Where I live in NE Georgia we have black carpenter ants and we have red fire ants. They are attracted to the sugar-water feed and the honey in the hives. If left uncontrolled, they will destroy a hive.
Installing packages in the Spring. Prime time for an ant invasion.
Here are several methods I use to try keeping ants under control.
VISIT THE BEE YARD OFTEN
I visit my hives frequently so I will be able to quickly respond to an ant invasion. If I fail to visit on a daily basis, I won’t know how long my bees have been dealing with the ants. It is important to keep check during the winter too. A rain shower and a warm day will bring the ants out.
WEED CONTROL
I keep the vegetation mowed around the beehive. Ants will take any advantage available to enter the hive and a tall blade of grass is just the bridge they like.
CINNAMON
Cinnamon is environmentally friendly and ants detest the stuff, but they love sugar-water more. This is not a 100% effective control, and I usually apply it everyday when the hives need feed. When I see the ants, I shake liberal amounts of cinnamon with the goal of coating them and covering their trail coming and going from the hive. While I want the cinnamon to adhere to the ants and block their entrance I am careful to not get any in the feeder pan. I don’t know if the bees would object to it or not but I don’t want to take a chance.
DIATOMACEOUS EARTH AND WOOD ASH
Another thing I use is food-grade Diatomaceous Earth. I apply the DE to the ground around the hive stand legs then use my hands or a rake to get it mixed in with the grass and dirt. This way the bees have minimal exposure, but the ants should have to walk right through it. My brother very lightly dusts his stands with DE. Use caution with DE. Even though it is a natural substance, it can kill your honeybees, as it is lethal to insects with an exoskeleton. Study up on it and decide if this is a good method for you. You can also spread wood ash underneath your hives. The DE and wood ash will need to be re-applied after a rain.
BURNT MOTOR OIL AND GREASE
Hive stand legs painted with burnt motor oil.
My dad applies burnt (used) motor oil to his hive stand legs. He has very minimal ant intrusion, Another method would be to place the stand legs in cans containing burnt motor oil. If you do this, check the cans regularly to ensure the oil has not been washed out by any rain.
You can also put bands of grease around the legs. The legs can get covered with dust and you would need to reapply the grease.
I do not think there is a way to completely eradicate ants from the bee yard, but consistently using some of these methods does help to control them. Whatever methods you choose, please take time to label any containers you use. It is easy to grab the wrong thing and cause unnecessary problems in the bee yard or for pets and children.
18 Comments
I have a sandy soil and plenty of ants looking to find shelter under the hive. Early in the season, when I set them out, I first drench the soil and the mulch with a good dose of Borax. (Just the 10 mule team stuff). I never really measured, but I guess about one cup per gallon?
I rarely have to repeat the treatment, but when I do, I drench all around the hive late in the evening, when the girls are in. Since the soil is sandy, It goes down right away and my bees never get to walk in the stuff. I’ve never lost a single bee, and I don’t have any ants of any kind near the hives. (but plenty of ants everywhere else!)
It’s cheap, it’s fast, it’s effective.
You might want to give it a try and see?
Ants don’t like orange peel. I chop it up and scatter it around inside my tortois’s heated house to keep out fire ants in winter.
Hanna, is that Osage orange, A.K.A “horse apples”? A friend from Illinois gave me a couple but it was to repel spiders. It might work on ants as well, perhaps?
Osage orange apples do not grow in Central Wisconsin. If you mean regular oranges, I dehydrate and chop the peel, but I like to use it in cakes / cookies. I’m not giving that good stuff to ants!
I heard too that orange is good against ants. There are detergents that are made with orange oil. Zep, Orange glow, Citrasolv… I bet you that if you wanted to use some of that, you would not have to use much at all, you could dilute it well, and it would save you the trouble of chopping all these good oranges 😉
Another advantage is that it might kill grass around the hives, cutting down on mowing?
I had an ant problem last year and took coffee cans filed with old motor oil and put the legs of my hive stands in them. Than I made covers to put over them at about 1 inch above the cans on the legs at an angle to deflect the rain, cured my ant problem for the whole year. I also keep the weeds and grass down around the stands.
How about putting the legs of the stands in water creating a moat, also supplying water for the bees.
It would be cleaner than having the legs stand in spent oil however, the vertical walls of such a contraption will very likely cause some drownings. also, the moat needs to be wide enough to prevent the ants from making a chain across the water. Drench the soil around the hives at night with a Borax solution. Borax melts their exoskeleton , so they will stay away from your hives.
If you go ahead and stand the legs in water, water the lawn nearby so bees can get all the water they want by drinking the dew without attempting to drink from these vertical cups.
We have argentine ants (aka: crazy ants) here. They are so persistent and come in such high numbers the only way i’ve been able to keep them out is to build the bases for my hive stands in five gallon buckets – with the bottom half filled with cement, the top half filled with water. I put a lid on the bucket and cut a hole out for the stand pole, leaving about a 1 inch gap (this has minimized bee drownings). The only time the ants have been able to get to my hives since using this method was once when a leaf fell between the lid and the pole ( i say fell, but i wouldn’t be surprised if the ants put it there…).
I had this problem years ago , all you need is one or two BLACK walnut leaves under the top.
The ants will vanish.
I bought a house a while back and the yard was full of fire ant hills the old owners went and got some grits and sprinkled them
Over the yard and the next day no sign of ants only ant parts. He said they eat the grits and it expands in them and they explode I didnt have any ants all year that I could tell even after heavy rains. Please research this before use I dont know if would harm bees.
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I had horrible results when I put the legs of my hive in containers of old motor oil. I lost several hundred bees in the first 24 hours (before I noticed), and they were still crawling into the oil as I was removing the containers. I’ve used water before with far less tragic results.
I had horrible results when I put the legs of my hive in containers of old motor oil. I lost several hundred bees in the first 24 hours (before I noticed), and they were still crawling into the oil as I was removing the containers. I’ve used water before with far less tragic results.
One more trick to running the ants away is to plant mint wherever you don’t want ants. They hate the stuff and I’ve used it several times to run the whole mound off. My MIL says it’s invasive, but may be an excellent replacement for grass around the hives.
I’ve used the motor oil by placing it in a water heater pan under each leg of the hive stand. Worked very well but ants are industrious little suckers. They’ll use any tall grass and even spider webs as bridges.
I’m going to try Duct tape wrapped around the base
Hi. My question is I have an ant problem in my bee hive. I have dusted it with cinnamon but it’s not working. Can I place those contained plastic traps that have ant rid bait inside . It is poison but it is enclosed . Is it okay ? It’s designed for the ants to get lured in there . The bait is inside a circular white self contained disc. . Cheers. Dee
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I just used the small traps that ants have to go into to get their “food” & put a couple around the hives & didn’t have any issue’s. Earwig’s are my issue this year.