the clove oil arrived and I drenched three clothes in the oil and have put them under jars and a cloche to keep them dry-ish.
I
can't say I hold out much hope. Initially the ants certainly didn't run away
screaming. They climbed all over everything, inside and out, closely
inspecting the new alien arrivals. I suspect they might like their home
even better now that it will be drier from all the coverings. We will
see.
As you might imagine, the clove oil didn't work at all. The ants seem quite happy with it.
I usually get ants' nests in one of my compost bins in the summer (despite the dampness). I will experiment next year with adding clove oil to certain sections to see if it makes any difference to them there.
Usually a bit of disturbance encourages the ants to move their eggs. I leave them a while to relocate and then dig out the compost later on.
Ants give me the creeps. Our last house had sandy soil and every time I pulled up a clump of grass in the border they poured out like lava from a volcano. Then there was flying ants nests.Yuk. Never found a solution to evict them.
Flying ants are the same species of ants in the same nests as the others … they’re just the queens and reproductive males getting ready to mate. Then they’re over and done with after a few days.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
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Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.