Pharoah ants

[anonkiana]

Hi, I need advice please.

I moved into block of flats in September last year and after the first night i moved in I opened one of my boxes that had a crumb of food and i kid you not there were at least 500-600 ants in it all over each other, from that day I have been complaining. As weather got cold appearance of these ants were getting less to the point the issue was almost non existent.

However now as weather is warmer, the issue is almost unbearable to live in as i am in a small studio flat. There must be at least 100 ants wandering around at all times across the bedroom, small bathroom and tiny kitchen.

They are everywhere, I even have to check my toothbrush in the morning or the toilet seat before i sit, my glass of drink when i put it down for even less than a minute.

My friends and family can vouch that i am a very clean and tidy person.

Pest control are unable to do anything after several visits because the issue lies in the walls.

Block management have refused to help, my estate agent has told me this in writing. I don't have time to look for an alternative place to live if they decide to terminate my tenancy (they did not let me out of 12 month contract at start of discovering this issue when i wanted to leave), this is unfair..

I have asthma and eczema so can't use certain pesticides in such a small closed space.

How to proceed? Please?

[jpkeates]

Write to your letting agent (old fashioned paper and envelope), outlining the problem, confirming that the issue is that the ants are in the walls and that this is something your landlord will have to address (because you are not allowed or able to get into the structure of the building itself). Ask them for a proposed solution and time scale within a reasonable period, say a fortnight, and, if they don't respond to your satisfaction, contact the local authority environmental health department.
Or just start with them.

[anonkiana]

Thank you for your fast response, really appreciated.

I will consider writing pen and paper (if I can remember how to do that), perhaps then they will take it more serious.

I have been in communication with my estate agent about this for a while, the landlords have agreed several times for pest control to come over however their methods are not enough to stop the amount of ants there are.

I live in a block of flats, so it's up to block management (in charge of all blocks rather than just the one flat) to fix this issue, they are the ones who are refusing to even look into the issue.

I will contact local authority environmental health department, hopefully they will be able to assist, thank you for this advise.

[AndrewDod]

Not "environmental health" - the pest control Dept of the Council. They need to treat the whole building. The treatments can take a long time (many months) to work.

I am not a fan of unnecessary use of pesticides (they cause many problems but not generally asthma). However that is going to be the (only) solution - digging out the ants just makes then generate a lot of satellite colonies. If you are refusing any pesticides there will be no solution.
I think generally these are special ant foods, not stuff that is sprayed around generally.

By the way only about 5% of the colony will be part of the team sent out to find food. So you are seeing only the 5% of the elite squad.

[nukecad]

You can get ant foods that the forragers carry back to the heart of the colony so that eventually the whole colony gets infected and dies or can't breed and dies out.

It takes a long time to erradicate them that way, and is costly with regular visits from the erradication specialists. Not all are licenced to use the 'foods' involved, not least because most are GM.

[Section20z]

You can buy affective ant killer in any hardware store or Wilko's, get the tubes of sticky goo they carry back to the nest. Will wipe them out in a few days.
If you buy one of those squeezy lemon juice bottles you can mark restricted areas as no ant will cross a lemon line.

[JK0]

I bet someone's got a manky shower cubicle. I had thousands of ants behind one of mine. They all went up the hoover.

[anonkiana]

Hi guys thanks for all your suggestions. We have these ant food things scattered all around but the ants don't seem to like it, we've tried a few of them and that solution doesn't work. There are so many tiny holes in this place in the walls etc, even pest control said it would be difficult to pinpoint where they are coming from. Pest control said Pharoah ants have to be treated differently to most ants. They suggested the only solution would be to fix the problem in the walls.. but block management are refusing to fix it so we are just living with ants everywhere and I'm fed up of it because now it's warm they keep finding anywhere to shelter that's cool in my tiny studio, we block one entrance then they come out another..

[nukecad]

This tells you twhy you can't get rid of them the same way as other ants, and that store bought ant killers will not work.

It gives suggestions on what you can do:
https://www.east-northamptonshire.go...8/pharaoh_ants

[anonkiana]

nukecad thank you 🙏