I have discovered lots of ants on the ground around my fruit trees. They may be congregating there because I am using those rubber mulch rings. Do I need to be concerned about these ants? If not, I'll just let them be, as they are not close to the house. I have also applied tanglefoot to the tree trunks to prevent the ants from climbing the trees and eating the fruit/leaves.

If I do need to eradicate them, should I use ant killer granules, or will they harm the trees? Else, would I have to replace the rubber mulch rings with real mulch?

Thanks! Free apples and pears for any good advice (*you have to pick them up)

If they aren't digging into the trees (like carpenter ants), I wouldn't worry about it right now, but would keep an eye on it.

If you use an insecticide near an edible fruit tree, make sure it's classed for that. You don't want to end up eating insecticide along with the fruit, and some of them will root-absorb.

I just thought...what about using diatomaceous earth?

It wouldn't hurt, go ahead if you want to. It needs to be re-applied post-rainfall, so I'd wait until you get a stretch of decent weather.

OK my 2-cents worth.

The ants are a clue to underlying more serious problem. They are raising, breeding, cultivating, and harvesting AHPHIDS for food. The Aphids are feeding on your fruits of labor. Get rid of the Aphids and the ants go with them.

There are lots of safe ways to deal with Aphids, like a very safe effective deadly poison called Pyrethrum. Also of use is Neem Oil or insecticide soaps which either contain either pyrethrum or neem oil with soap.

For a DIY you can go to a local nursery or even a box store and buy a bottle of insecticide soap with pyrethrum, a hose end sprayer bottle and treat it yourself. Otherwise hire a pro to do it with industrial strength pyrethrum. If you DIY buy enough for 2 or 3 applications and be sure to give the tree a good soaking. The pyrethrum will kill every creepy crawly it comes into contact with, and be gone tomorrow ready for you to eat the fruit.

John_in_SC wrote:A little known fact about Fire Ants in the deep south (Which you probably don't have up north there...)... They are one of the few things that eats Fleas and Ticks..... so while I hate Ants... I hate fleas and ticks worse... so the ants can stay unless they are coming in the house.....

Who cares if they eat ticks and fleas when they can kill you, your loved ones, and livestock. If you have ever been stung by one, rushed your wife to a hospital to save her life, or cost you thousands of dollars in lost livestock you would have a different opinion about them. Fire Ants are devils and deserve to DIE a quick painful death.

In Wisconsin, those aren't fire ants. Most likely, anyway.

My response to fire ants (which we don't get in PA either as it gets too cold) would be to pull out some enormous guns and possibly just nuke the entire site from orbit. Just to be sure.

Will this work?

Bonide Bon-Neem

Barley wrote:Will this work?

Bonide Bon-Neem

Sure will, ratio is just right of 50:1 for hose end sprayer. Only other thing is to make sure the hose end sprayer will have the range.

The trees are barely taller than me, and are dwarf and semi-dwarf, so I don't think range will ever be a problem.

This won't kill bees, will it? I need them to pollinate the trees!

Texasweed,

Sorry to keep bugging you on this, but I need your advice. Which is better for my situation, Neem Oil or Insecticidal soap? My goals are:

- Keep leaf-eating parasites off my fruit trees
- While most of my fruit trees (apple and pear) are "disease resistant" varieties, I could stand for added disease control, assuming it does not hurt anything
- Want to keep things as organic/safe to eat as possible.

I'm looking at these options:

Insecticidal Soap

Neem Oil

Thank you sir!

Barley wrote:This won't kill bees, will it? I need them to pollinate the trees!

Shouldn't kill the bees if they are not present at the time you spray. The poison degrades in after 24 hours assuming sun shine.

However not it will kill the bees upon contact, especially pyrethrum products as it is the active ingredient in all wasp, hornet, and bee sprays. Pyrethrum will kill all creepy crawleys on contact, however is safe on humans and pets. Pyrethrum is a natural organic pesticide extracted from daisies.

Barley wrote:Texasweed,

Sorry to keep bugging you on this, but I need your advice. Which is better for my situation, Neem Oil or Insecticidal soap? My goals are:

- Keep leaf-eating parasites off my fruit trees
- While most of my fruit trees (apple and pear) are "disease resistant" varieties, I could stand for added disease control, assuming it does not hurt anything
- Want to keep things as organic/safe to eat as possible.

I'm looking at these options:

Insecticidal Soap

Neem Oil

Thank you sir!

In addition to the question above regarding the two products I linked to, is there a difference between pyrethrum, which you described, and pyrethrin?

Pyrethrin

Barley wrote:

Barley wrote:Texasweed,

Sorry to keep bugging you on this, but I need your advice. Which is better for my situation, Neem Oil or Insecticidal soap? My goals are:

- Keep leaf-eating parasites off my fruit trees
- While most of my fruit trees (apple and pear) are "disease resistant" varieties, I could stand for added disease control, assuming it does not hurt anything
- Want to keep things as organic/safe to eat as possible.

I'm looking at these options:

Insecticidal Soap

Neem Oil

Thank you sir!

In addition to the question above regarding the two products I linked to, is there a difference between pyrethrum, which you described, and pyrethrin?

Pyrethrin

Simple answer is Pyrethrum is organic extracted from daisies, and Permethin is synthetic or man made.

I'm not talking about permethrin. I'm talking about pyrethrum vs. pyrethrin. I THINK it's the same thing but I could use second opinion. It it pretty confusing!

Seems like y'all are worked up into a frenzy and jumping to conclusions about the ants. Do we know they have become a pest?

Well this started as an ants thread, and morphed into an aphid thread. Somewhat related, since if the ants crawl up the tree and "protect" their aphid prey from other beneficial predators (e.g., ladybugs), the aphids can be a problem.

So, I'm using tanglefoot for the ants, and am curious about organic insecticides and disease control in case I ever need it.

Not getting worked up...just in information gathering mode. Soon enough I'll be an expert, I hope

Some report good results pouring sugar-water on the ant mound, or molasses. I've done it and it seems to work--by fostering massive bacterial and fungal blooms in their tunnels, which doesn't make them want to stay there.

I'm not asking the ants to up and die, I'm requesting that they move a few feet over so they aren't in my way. For the little black ants I get, that works really well.

This year I have four ant hills that I've identified in the gardens (by sticking my hands into them by accident and getting a few dozen bites at a shot--annoying, a bit itchy, not dangerous). None are in areas I'll need to interfere with, and none are near the house. I'm fine with that, and figure they have every right to live here too.

What Morph just wrote about sugar on the mounds works unless the ants are sugar ants. There are two (maybe more) kinds of ants: those that collect protein (grains, meat) and those that collect sugar. For those that collect sugar I have had excellent results with a concoction I read about back in the 70s. It's a gooey mess of 1/2 cup molasses, 1/2 cup sugar, and one packet of baking yeast. Smear that on a piece of cardboard and leave it in their trail with a little bit of the goo dripping off. My ants had trouble finding it until I let some overhang onto the fence they were traveling on. But once they found it, they had little interest in my house anymore. They sucked the cardboard dry and I had to reload twice. But each time I reloaded there were significantly fewer ants...until they were gone. My theory on that is the yeast screws up their underground farm. I don't subscribe to any theory about ants eating anything, then drinking and swelling up and bursting. It's all about screwing up the food in their underground chambers. With this in mind, you might be able to short cut the time it takes by making a sugar and yeast solution and pouring that over the mound. In my case the ant hill was not on my property. I never did know where it was. They came down the neighbor's fence all the way from the other side of his property.

Another possible mix is boric acid and sugar. Boric acid kills almost all insects. All you have to do is get them to walk through it. Sugar is the bait and the boric acid just gets on them or in them.