There’s nothing better than sitting back and relaxing after spending an hour and some elbow grease cleaning your kitchen until it shines. Conversely, there’s nothing worse than looking over your beautiful, spotless kitchen and seeing a trail of tiny black specks marching toward the fruit bowl from the corner of your eye. These little black specks are called pharaoh ants and have a popular nickname, “sugar ants”, but there’s nothing sweet about them.
Pharaoh ants aren’t the type of ants that cause painful bites to your skin, and they don’t pose an existential risk to your home or family, but they’re gross. And if you ask us, that’s all the reason you need to establish a pest control plan to rid your home of them for good.
What Is A Pharaoh Ant?
Pharaoh ants are a tiny breed of ants that can easily enter your home undetected in search of, you guessed it, sugar, which is where they got their nickname. But that’s not all they eat. They’re happy to snack on whatever little crumbs they can find on your counter. Because they originate in warm climates, pharaoh ants are almost exclusively found in the southern part of the United States. Lucky for us, Florida is one of the most likely places you are to encounter pharaoh ants.
Because of their size, it can be challenging to determine how and where they are gaining access to your home. Often they’re squeezing their tiny bodies through small cracks in your walls or foundation that are likely invisible to the naked eye. One great way to determine where they’re entering your home is to start from the outside. Look for a trail of ants leading toward a possible entry point on the exterior of your home. While it’s not a permanent solution, you make it more difficult for them to access your kitchen counters by closing up the entrance points to your home as best as possible.
Pharaoh ants don’t pose a huge health risk to your family, as we mentioned above. They don’t bite, and they’re unlikely to carry dangerous diseases. But still, they don’t belong in your home. If you ask us, Florida homeowners deserve to feel a sense of security and confidence in their homes, and for most of us, that means knowing they’re not going to spend the entire summer battling a marching band of tiny pests.
How Do You Get Rid Of Them?
There are two approaches to eliminating pharaoh ants, and they work in tandem. First, since we know that pharaoh ants are entering your home in search of food, you must do everything possible to eliminate their access to your food and keep your countertops clean. Some of the most common attractors of these pests are open sources of food, smears of peanut butter left on the countertop, and open dog food bowls on the floor. We know you have a busy life, and you do your best to keep your kitchen clean, but we promise you can cut back on your exposure to the pharaoh ants with a few hacks. Consider putting your dry goods in sealable containers, wipe down the countertops each time the kitchen has been used, and invest in a sealed pet food container.
But of course, we can’t end this article without talking about the importance of professional pest control. If you’ve read along with us for many years, we’re probably beginning to sound like a broken record. But we believe so strongly in consistent pest control that we will keep shouting it from the rooftops for as long as necessary. The once-in-a-while approach to pest control is inefficient and ineffective in the long term. Regardless of what type of pest you’re fighting against, to have the upper hand, you must invest in an ongoing service that keeps your home protected even when you don’t know you need it.
At Holder Pest Control, our clients don’t have to panic every spring and summer with the awakening of pests that spend the winter hibernating because they know their home is already protected. If you would like to put down your anxieties about pests like pharaoh ants invading your kitchen, it’s time to invest in a service that will be there even before you need it. Contact us today for more information about how holder pest control can help you prevent the infestation of pharaoh ants and even more dangerous pests.
