Carpenter Ants

Carpenter Ants trailing on building

Carpenter ants are the most common ant pest found in the Northeastern United States. They cause structural damage when they excavate wood for nest sites. Unlike termites, carpenter ants do not eat wood, but rather scavenge on dead insects and collect sugary secretions (“honeydew”) produced by other insects such as aphids. Carpenter ants are a nuisance pest when workers are spotted inside foraging for food and when winged swarmers are found inside.

Carpenter Ant Factoids

Carpenter Ants hollowing out wood.

• Wood is Not-So-Tasty: 
Carpenter ants tunnel through moisture-damaged wood and spit out wood shavings. The resulting waste piles look like sawdust and often include ant body parts.

• A Numbers Game:
There are approximately 24 species of carpenter
ants that are pests in North America; nine of these species are present in the northeast.

• Hanging Out:
Carpenter ant larvae are clumped together by J-shaped hairs, and cling like Velcro to the roof of their galleries.

German Cockroach

Figure 1. Adult female German cockroach, Blattella germanica (Linnaeus), with ootheca. Photograph by James Castner, University of Florida.

Figure 2. German Roach Stages

                      

Life Cycle

The German cockroach has three life stages typical of insects with incomplete metamorphosis: the egg, nymph, and adult. The entire life cycle is completed in about 100 days. However, factors such as temperature, nutritional status, and strain differences may influence the time required to complete a life cycle. German cockroaches breed continuously with many overlapping generations present at any one time. Under ideal conditions, population growth has been shown to be exponential. Actively growing field populations are comprised of 80 percent nymphs and 20 percent adults. The German cockroach is omnivorous, eating table scraps, pet food, and even book bindings.

Medical and Economic Significance

German cockroach’s adulterate food or food products with their feces and defensive secretions, physically transport and often harbor pathogenic organisms, may cause severe allergic responses, and in extremely heavy infestations have been reported to bite humans and feed on food residues on the faces of sleeping humans. In addition, some scientists suggest that German cockroach infestations may cause human psychological stress and that the stigma associated with infestations alters human behavior. For example, people with infested houses do less entertaining, and avoid the kitchen at night for fear of encountering a cockroach. 

For more information visit us at www.MagicExterminating.com 

Pavement Ants



Pavement Ants

 Pavement ants are 3/16 of an inch. Workers are about half as long as one of your shirt buttons is wide. They are dark reddish-black and have antennae that bulge out at the tips so they look like they’re waving little clubs off their foreheads.


Where it lives: Pavement ants most often nest under bricks or pavement, but they are also found in grassy areas near sidewalks and even in extreme environments, like salt marshes.

What it eats: Ultimate opportunists, pavement ants eat anything from dead insects to honeydew, a sugary food planthoppers produce. They also dine on pollen, food in your kitchen, and garbage.

NYC notes: Here is an ant with a New York ethos. It is, we suspect, more common beneath the cement of sidewalks and roads than anywhere else. Something about the cement becomes it. It’s a possibility that they may like the heat, the vibration of the road, or being close to New York’s exciting human life.



For more information visit us one the web at www.MagicExterminating.com

Pest of the Month- Carpenter Bees





Fig. 1. A carpenter bee visiting a flower. Note the yellow hairs on the thorax and the shiny black abdomen, which is hairless. (Photograph Tom Murray www.pbase.com/tmurray74 )



Fig. 2. A section of wood cut in half to expose the chambers or cells constructed by a carpenter bee. (USDA Forest Service Archive, USDA Forest Service, www.Bugwood.org)

Injury: Carpenter bees bore into wood to make a home for their young. In preferred sites, bees can drill a large number of holes. They are holes 1/2 inch in diameter. Often the same nesting sites are used year after year, and the same tunnels are reused. Porches, garages, shed ceilings and trim, railings, roof overhangs and outdoor wooden furniture, are all common nesting sites. Continued borings may weaken some wooden structures, and the yellow "sawdust and pollen" waste materials may stain cars, clothing, or furniture.

Behavior: The males are territorial, and in the spring they often guard the potential nest sites. They discourage intruders by hovering or darting at any moving thing that ventures into the nesting area. This can create a "human annoyance" factor, and it is one that often startles and concerns the homeowner.

However, male carpenter bees do not sting. The female carpenter bee, like many other bees, can sting - but it is uncommon for her to do so.

NPMA Technical Update: The Importance of Bed Bug Salivary Glands

NPMA Technical Update: The Importance of Bed Bug Salivary Glands

Drs. Jerome Goddard and Kristine Edwards of Mississippi State University have investigated the effects of bed bug saliva on human skin. Secretions from salivary glands have long been thought to be the cause of dermal reactions among certain people bitten by bed bugs, but there was insufficient supporting evidence. The scientists were able to demonstrate the role of saliva by removing the salivary glands of bed bugs and allowing them to feed on a person known to produce a dermal reaction upon being bitten. Although the volunteer could feel the bite of a bed bug that lacked salivary glands, the bug was unable to feed and her skin did not react as it did to a normal bed bug bite. In a second experiment, a salivary extract was prepared from bed bugs and applied topically to the volunteer's skin. Within 36 hours, the volunteer reported itching and a visible dermal reaction. This research presents strong evidence that salivary glands are important to both feeding and likely contain allergens that can cause adverse reactions in victims.  

This paper, "Effects of Bed Bug Saliva on Human Skin", was published in the American Medical Association Journal of Dermatology in March of 2013.

Winter Ants by Ralph H Maestre BCE

Winter Ants by Ralph H Maestre BCE
Lasius niger Black Garden Ant	A potential pest ant is the Black Garden Ant, Lasius species, which has workers approximately 2-5 mm in length and is monomorphic (all the same size). They have several different species with various body colors. Black Garden Ants are found throughout the US. This ant forms mega-colonies with multiple queens.
They tend aphids for honeydew and eat living and dead insects. They love sugar-based products inside home. The colony size may reach over 15,000 ants and cover very large areas. One colony in Europe covered northern Spain, southern France into northern Italy. That is like saying one colony covering an area from New York City south to Washington DC. This may be an exaggeration but you get the idea. Anything you do on a property may only be like trimming the finger nails on a human. The body is so large that the nails just grow back. This is to say that the colony will bounce back very quickly. A very aggressive approach to pest control including both the inside and outside of the property would be required. Prenolepis impairs False Honey Ant or Winter Ant The winter ant is in reference to its foraging at temperatures barely above freezing during the cooler months. False Honey Ant is an unfortunate name, since the storage product in the corpulent young workers of these ants is fatty, not sugary. The body lengths for the worker is 2.5-3.5mm, the queen about 8mm, male 3-4mm. The ant has a very shiny head, thorax, and abdomen very dark brown in color. The legs and antennae of live specimens are medium brown at base, smoothly shading to pale yellow at tips (this color arrangement gives the overall impression of an insect that is very dark in the middle and very pale at the extremities). The range for the winter ant is most of the United States, plus southern Ontario and Mexico. This ant usually nests in the soil with some clay content in wooded situations or occasionally constructing a chamber under a rock or log. This ant is often associated with oak woodlands of various sorts (or scrub oak thickets in the west), but also (beech-) maple. The winter ant often build their nests deep underground, staying inactive during the summer months, and returning to activity when the weather cools. They are the earliest to swarm of our cool climate North American ants. The workers feed on honeydew, secretions of flowers, sap flows, exudates from galls, earthworms and arthropods (usually as carrion), and ripened or decaying fruit. The life cycle o f the males and females are reared in late summer, then overwinter in the underground nest, and take their nuptial flights in the spring. Young workers are "overfed" and swell with fat, from which a nutritious glandular secretion is produced. This becomes the main food upon which the year's single brood of workers and alates (winged ants) are reared.
Pachycondyla chinensis Asian Needle Ant	One of the few ants that are specialized for cold temperature foraging; they can be found foraging even at near freezing temperatures, where they are often the only ants visibly active. However, their range does not extend into the far north, despite their cold tolerance.
Pachycondyla chinensis, the Asian needle ant, was first detected in the United States in Dekalb County, Georgia in approximately 1932. This species is an average sized, dark brownish-black ant with an evident stinger. It is considered an invasive species that establishes large populations that may displace native species. Reactions in humans from the sting o this exotic species range from mild to severe, sometimes with long lasting symptoms. Consequently, the Asian needle ant poses an emerging health threat throughout its range, as well as areas to where it may be spreading. However, it is not overly aggressive. Stings typically result from handling workers or by winged queens landing on individuals and becoming trapped between clothing layers and skin.

Asian needle ant typically nests in soil in somewhat damp areas, especially below stones, in rotting logs and stumps, or other debris. In urban settings it may also be found under mulch, railroad ties, bricks and pavers. Colony size ranges from less than 100 individuals to several thousand, and multiple queens may be present. Unlike many introduced, invasive ant species, it can nest in natural wooded habitats. This species appears to prefer termites as a food source.

This introduced species is thought to have been introduced from Japan. In the United States it is known to occur in Alabama (MEM record), Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, New York, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia.

Sources:

Mississippi State Entomological Museum, Asian Needle Ant

Wikipedia, False Honey Ant or Winter Ant

Ant Control Techniques by Ralph H Maestre BCE

Ant control can and will be difficult to obtain. Ants still remain the number one pest on most pest management professional lists. Many methods are employed to control them and many fail. Long term methods generally employ exclusion or pest proofing. I will explain some of the current methods used by MPM. First I will give a very brief introduction of the different ant species we deal with and then speak on the control techniques.

Carpenter Ants· Small minor workers ¼ inch long · Large major workers ½ inch long · Large black or reddish ant · Polymorphic (multiple sizes in the colony)

One the most prominent species of ants we encounter is the carpenter ant. There are several species, but all are treated in the same way by us. Carpenter ants are among the largest ants found in homes and live in colonies containing three castes consisting of winged and wingless queens, winged males and different sized workers. Winged males are much smaller than winged queens.

Swarmers emerge from mature colonies usually from March to July. The colony does not produce swarmers until about three years later. A mature colony, after three to six years, has 2,000 to 4,000 individuals. Workers regurgitate food for nourishment of the developing larvae and queen.


In later generations, workers of various sizes are produced (polymorphism) into major and minor workers that are all sterile females. Nests are usually established in soft, moist (not wet), decayed wood or occasionally in an existing wood cavity or void area in a structure that is perfectly dry. The walls of the nest are smooth and clean (sandpapered appearance) with shredded sawdust-like wood fragments, like chewed up toothpicks (frass), carried from the nest and deposited outside.


The most important and often most difficult part of carpenter ant control is locating the nest or nests. Once the nest location is found, control is very easy and simple. Steps to a successful inspection include an interview with family members, inspection indoors, inspection outdoors and sound detection.

Pharaoh Ants· About 1/16 inch long · Light yellow to reddish brown with abdomen slightly darker · Monomorphic workers · Has two nodes and no spines on the thorax · No stringer · Three segment clubbed antennae

Female Pharaoh Ants can lay 400 or more eggs in her lifetime. Mature colonies contain several queens, winged males, sterile females or workers, eggs, larvae, prepupae and pupae growing to as large as 300,000 or more members.

Periodically a queen, together with a few workers carrying immatures (eggs, larvae and pupae), leaves the nest and sets up a new colony elsewhere, quickly spreading an infestation. This behavior pattern is known as "satelliting," "fractionating" or "budding" where part of the colony migrates to a new location rather than by single females dispersing after a reproductive swarm. Budding may occur due to overcrowding, seasonal changes in the building's central heating and cooling system or application of a repellent pesticide (really known as fission).

Nests usually occur in wall voids, under floors, behind baseboards, in trash containers, under stones, in cement or stone wall voids, in linens, light fixtures, etc.

Pharaoh ants are usually much harder to control than other ants because of their ability to disperse. About 90 percent of the colony remains hidden in the nest so even if 10 percent of the colony is killed by a residual pesticide, the remaining reservoir of ants is enormous. Conventional contact pesticide applications especially repellent products such as pyrethrins may spread infestations to new areas with multiple colonies blossoming within the structure. These ants will avoid certain pesticides.

Odorous House AntsBrown coloration Body 1/8 inch in length Workers are all one size (monomorphic)

Colonies vary in size and range from a few hundred to 10,000 individuals, usually with multiple queens. Sexual forms are produced only in colonies that are at least four to five years old. Mating may take place within the nest or nearby. Colonies multiply when one or more fertile females accompanied by numerous workers leave the parent colony, found a new nest, and start a new colony. Single inseminated queens from nuptial flights also may establish new colonies independently.

The odorous house ant, Tapinoma sessile (Say), is a native species that occurs throughout the United States. Outside, it commonly nests in soil beneath most any object, including stones, logs, concrete blocks, and fallen limbs. It also nests under the bark of logs and stumps and in plant cavities, refuse piles, under mulch in flower beds, and nests of birds and animals.

It is critical to survey inside and outside to locate all nests. Nests found outside can be drenched with a residual insecticide. When numerous ants appear around the building foundation, a perimeter treatment with a residual non-repellent insecticide should be used. Baits that have a protein or sugar-based attractant may be effective when the nest is not accessible.

Magic’s Management Program always begins with baiting. Use the various baits we have available like Intice gel, Intice granular, Advance gel, Advance 388B, Advance granular, Advion Pucks, and the new Advion gel. All of these are highly effective bait. Use the buffet style of baiting, this means don’t rely on only one of the baits. You will fail and numerous call-backs will occur. In conjunction with this you may use only a liquid spray, such as Phantom. Use Phantom both outside and inside the perimeter of the structure. This is a non-repellent and is effective. There are new products Fast-out foam and Transport GHP new to our arsenal. These products are showing very good results and are also non-repellents. NyGuard is an IGR that can and should be incorporated into our pest management program against ants. NyGuard may be used with both non-repellents and baits.

Termidor is to be used only by the field supervisors. This is a last resort situation.When it comes to carpenter ants, if the nest is located then we will drill and inject product using the actisol machine or dust. The dust may be Drione, Tri-Die, or Borid. Repair to leak can be handled by our carpentry division.

Nest found outside, small mounds of dirt, may be sprayed using pyrethroids. This is the only time you may use one of these products. Phantom cannot be used always from the structure. Always read your labels and provide them to the customer.

If a follow-up is needed, then it should be no less than ten to fourteen days later. This will allow for the product to take effect.

		Potentially two other species may be found in our area that enters structures. The first one is the False Honey Ant, Prenolepis impairs, the workers are monomorphic, 2 to 4 mm long, and have a one-segmented petiole. Also known as the small or winter ant is found throughout the US and often associated with Oak trees (Gregg 1963; Ebeling 1975; Wheeler and Wheeler 1986). They like damp soil in shady places and are usually the first ants seen in the spring time. Treatment consists of gels or baits with dust being used in void. Direct liquid treatment to nest site is recommended.
	The other potential pest ant is the Black Garden Ant, Lasius species, has workers approximately 2-5 mm in length and is monomorphic. They have several different species with various body colors. Black Garden Ants are found throughout the US. This ant forms mega-colonies with multiple queens. They tend aphids for honeydew and eat living and dead insects. They love sugar-based products inside home. The colony size may reach over 100,000 ants and cover very large areas. One colony in Europe covered northern Spain, southern France into northern Italy. That is like saying one colony covering an area from New York City down to Washington DC. This may be an exaggeration but you get the idea. Anything you do on a property may only be like trimming your finger nails. The colony will bounce back very quickly. A very aggressive approach would be needed and only a service manager with the technician can ascertain what the proper approach would be.