Electronics-Loving 'Crazy Ants' Invading Southern US

From an article at the Houston Chronicle (not The Onion) comes a report of concern to anyone in a warm climate with, well, electronics. From the article: "According to researchers at The University of Texas at Austin, invasive 'crazy ants' are slowly displacing fire ants in the southeastern United States. These 'Tawny Crazy Ants' have a peculiar predilection toward electronics as well. 'They nest in electronics and create short circuits, as they create a contact bridge between two points when they get electrocuted they release an alarm pheromone,' says UT research assistant Edward LeBrun. 'The other ants are attracted to the chemicals that other ants give off,' he adds. At this point, more ants arrive and create a larger nest." The L.A. Times also has a report, which says "Thus far, the crazy ants are not falling for the traditional poisons used to eliminate fire ant mounds. And when local mounds are destroyed manually, they are quickly regenerated. 'They don't sting like fire ants do, but aside from that they are much bigger pests,' LeBrun said. 'There are videos on YouTube of people sweeping out dustpans full of these ants from their bathroom. You have to call pest control operators every three or four months just to keep the infestation under control. It's very expensive.'"

Comments

What do these things eat?

[anubi]

That is my first concern. If they eat wood, its bad news... really bad news. If they eat other bugs, I am gonna leave them alone.

If they like termites, where can I get some?

Re:What do these things eat?

[Immerman]

Heh heh.

In seriousness though, why would you object to a house centipede infestation? They're harmless and provide a valuable service. If you have enough of them to really be considered an infestation then that's practically a guarantee that you have a serious infestation of something far more objectionable that they're chowing down on. When that infestation is gone the vast majority of centipedes will go looking for greener pastures. It's like a farmer complaining about the cat infestation in his grain silo.

ants and electricity

[Black Parrot]

I've long noticed that ants seem to have a predilection for electricity. They crawl all over electrical conduits, enter homes at electrical outlets, etc.

Re:ants and electricity

[girlintraining]

I've long noticed that ants seem to have a predilection for electricity. They crawl all over electrical conduits, enter homes at electrical outlets, etc.

It's because they can sense electromagnetic fields, which all electronics give off. Of course, the solution for dealing with these new ants is simple, but counterintuitive -- spray everything with this 'alarm' pheremone. If ants navigate by scent trail, and that's how they rebuild their nests, and it's too challenging to remove the scent trails... then you are left with only one option:

Blind the little bastards by coating everything in it. It's my understanding that, without those trails, they'll be helpless to organize to find food, each other, or even the way home. Everything depends on those trails... so if you overload their sense organs and blind them, they'll perish. After they're dead, the pheremones sprayed will slowly dissipate, but importantly... the trails they've laid down will dissipate faster, so the area is then chemically neutral again.

It is, quite literally, chemical warfare. (-_-)

Here's a solution

[houbou]

Use those old Cisco routers from 10 yrs ago... as ant baits! :)