How To Deal With Tiny Ants On Your Kitchen Counter in New Jersey

It’s a beautiful morning, and you hop out of bed, ready to tackle the day. Your coffee is brewing, sending tantalizing aromas wafting through your home. You pour a piping hot cup of Joe and reach for the sugar.

Oh no, the sugar bowl is moving inside. Ants have invaded your sugar, and now that coffee doesn’t sound nearly as appealing. When you opened the bowl, you set them free, and now they’re crawling on the counter and all over the place.

Upon further inspection, you notice that it isn’t just your sugar bowl they’ve invaded, but they are everywhere. Your once clean kitchen now feels like it’s been taken over by tiny creatures crawling with bacteria. How did they get here, and how do you get rid of them?

Source: https://hgic.clemson.edu/tiny-ants-around-your-home/

Which Ant is On My Counters?

When you experience these tiny critters inside your home, it’s only natural to think of the sugar ant. This slang term is used far and wide throughout New Jersey to describe these pests. Ironically, there are more than 12,000 species that scientists have identified worldwide.

Don’t worry; you won’t have nearly that many to contend with in your abode. The most common ants in your home are likely the house, sugar, or carpenter variety. Since so many of them look similar in size and shape, it’s no wonder people use a catch-all phrase to describe them.

If you have a leak in your plumbing, you may have attracted the brown ant, as they have a penchant for moisture. House ants tend to have a pungent odor that smells rotten. So if you have a foul smell in the air, it could be these little critters.

Some say that they smell like rotten coconuts, especially when you step on them. Thank goodness these little pests don’t pose serious health risks to you, but they can contaminate your food. Did you know that ants are this state’s number one insect issue?

No wonder many homeowners keep a pest control specialist on speed dial, as no one wants anything like this in their house. An interesting ant that you might encounter is the pharaoh ant. These little insects are yellow, and boy, do they like sweets. They prefer dead things, which will harbor around your plants and moisture area.

Though they’re certainly not the most prevalent ant in the New Jersey area, you may occasionally run across them. Unlike some ants, these critters spread disease and can cause serious health issues to you and your family. The pavement ants are a different ballgame, as they don’t like coming inside the home.

They prefer to be out and burrow underneath the pavement. They will only wander into your home when they’re low on food. They like to stay outside and close to their colony.

They’re usually brown or black and are one of the more difficult ants to control. Another major issue with these ants is that they will sting you if they feel threatened, so it’s best to avoid getting up close and personal with them.

Since most ants have similar characteristics, it’s best to have a professional help you identify and treat them. It’s easier to eradicate the problem once you’ve identified them.

Why Are There Ants Invading My Kitchen?

Since you have an infestation in your kitchen, you need to know what’s bringing them into your home. The sugar ants that get inside are searching for food. They like sugary sweet things, as they can’t pass up a blob of jelly or splatter of pudding on the floor. Are your countertops sticky?

You may have left some residue behind that you might not even know is there, but they can smell it a mile away. Due to the small size of the sugar ant, they can easily climb into your cabinets to find that one piece of cereal your child spilled from the box. They’re excellent scavengers and will quickly identify anything you’ve left behind in your cleaning.

It’s so vital that you keep food closed and covered, especially cereals. They see open containers as a welcomed invitation to come in and dine. If you want to prevent these ants from coming into your home in the first place, you need to be proactive. Here are some of the things you can do to keep them at bay:

Don’t leave pet bowls full and sitting out as it attracts ants and rodents.

There should be no crumbs left on the kitchen table after any meal.

Clean up any spills from food or drinks immediately.

You must keep all trash cans covered with a lid. If you must throw food away, close the bag and take it to your outdoor receptacle.

Leaving overripened fruit on your counter is like rolling out the welcome mat for ants.

Make sure your dishes are washed after each meal. Dishes in the sink attract insects, including ants and roaches.

Use plastic sealed containers in your cabinets and pantry area to ensure no ant can get into them. Plus, your food will last longer in air-tight containers.

Make sure you have no dripping faucets or pipes leaking, as this will bring in ants that like moisture. Sadly, it can also draw things like water bugs, roaches, silverfish, and many other insects that thrive on decaying materials.

Clean your garbage cans often. Food frequently leaks down on the inside and can linger once the trash is gone.

Seal any cracks around windows, doors, or the foundation of your home, as these are accessible entryways for pests.

Many New Jersey homeowners find that it’s a challenge to keep ants away, and this is especially true if you have young children. All the frequent spills from your brood can be very inviting to these critters, so your cleaning routine must be enhanced to keep them at bay.

Most people view ants as a problem that they can take care of themselves, but it can be more challenging to eradicate these insects than you might think. The key is to prevent them as it makes them more manageable.

Getting Rid of Ants in Your Home

It’s an ominous feeling to have tiny intruders in your home, and you may feel like you’re losing your sanity. It would help if you took proper precautions and did some research to get rid of them, as what works for one ant won’t work for another. The good news is that there are many effective ways to get rid of those pesky ants.

It will help if you choose treatment options based on the best needs of the people inside the home. If you have people in the house with breathing problems, you need to be selective about the chemicals you use in your abode. Also, pets and younger children are a significant consideration in the pesticides you choose.

Additionally, you can drive the ants from your kitchen and send them into another area of the home if you don’t kill them. So the goal is to destroy them, so they don’t pack their bags and head for your children’s bedroom.

Source: https://www.pesttracker.org/redirect.php?i=22188

DIY Solutions

Many DIY solutions don’t work. There are many variables, such as how bad the infestation is, what type of ant you’re dealing with, and how good you are at preventative maintenance. Before you call for professional help, you need to know how ants thrive.

The ants crawling on your kitchen counter are only a tiny fraction of what’s invading your home. See, putting bait or using spot-treatments can stop some of the activity, but you need to get to the nest and get the rest of the colony. The key is to reach the source of the infestation, which is the problem with many DIY methods, as they often fall short of this goal.

If you don’t target the source, you’re only killing the few insects you see. Many of the colonies, like the pavement ants, are entirely outside. The ants running through your home are only there to get food and water to bring back the others.

The abundant number of ants that live in a colony makes them challenging to treat. There can be thousands in the colony without you even knowing about them. They only move from the settlement when they need food and have run out of resources close to the nest.

The average worker ant will travel up to 300 yards from their nest. So this means if you have ants in the backyard or the cracks of your porch, they can quickly come inside. Here are some of the most common DIY methods that people use to get rid of ants on their kitchen counters:

Coffee Grounds

Food Barrier Method

Vinegar

Boric Acid and Sugar Trap Method

Essential Oils

If you go to your local hardware store to buy a treatment, you have a good chance that it will at least kill some of the ants. Now, keep in mind that choosing the right product for your situation is the tricky part. You don’t want to pay a fortune for chemicals when you could have quickly taken that money and paid for an exterminator.

This is the tricky balance you must consider if one product doesn’t work, and you keep buying different ones. Did you know that these store-bought methods are supposed to be “quick fixes?” They get the ants you see so that you have some relief, but many of these products don’t have the power to eradicate the colony.

Reading reviews about the product’s success, safety, and endurance can help you to avoid wasting money. Also, the FDA has guidelines on these products to ensure they meet reasonable standards.

Why Professional Pest Control Is Best?

While you may put a lot of time and effort into getting rid of pests, it’s always best to call professionals for help. It’s really the only way that you’re going to get rid of them for good. Additionally, pest control services guarantee that you’re not wasting your money, which doesn’t happen when you buy over-the-counter store remedies.

It’s stressful to fight ants and all the filth they leave behind, but you can let us handle the pressure, as we handle it daily. Our proactive approach will ensure we eradicate the ants, but we will also help with the preventative part. We educate our customers on how to avoid such a situation again and look around the home for possible entry points.

We aim to ensure no creeping crawlies in the future so that you can rest easily at night. Call us today for an estimate if you need help with ants or any other kind of pest. It’s time that you take back your kitchen and your sanity. These ants need to go!