Carpenter Ants
If you are staying in and around Minnesota, you would surely want to hear more on Carpenter Ants. Seems like these ants are everywhere in Minnesota! Quite needless to say, these are unnecessary additions in your homes, and need to be dealt away with rather quickly. That said, it will be great if you know a thing or two about them.
Normally, you will find carpenter ants in the size range of 3/8 inches to ½ inch. These ants are normally found black or reddish black in color, with the winged queen ants being the biggest of them all. The winged queen carpenter ants are as big as an inch! Yet, with these size characteristics, a lot of people confuse carpenter ants for winged termites.
Here is the difference explained
Termites have rather straight antennae, and slightly obese waists, whereas carpenter ants are symbolized by their narrow waists, darker bodies, and shorter back swings. These ants can also be found rather commonly in the open.
Carpenter Ants are known to be hard-workers. The fact that they travel up to 100 yards in search for food at times is enough proof of this. Indoors, you will find them feeding on protein and sugar. Outdoors, carpenter ants feed on pretty much any insect, living or dead. One thing you must know about carpenter ants is that they never eat wood. They remove wood pieces to make tunnels and galleries. Unfortunately, those tunnels may not be big enough for a SUV to pass through, but they are huge enough for an army of these carpenter ants to motor by.
Make sure all food items in your home are covered well. Keep them open and for sure, you would have an open invitation ready for carpenter ants. By now, you would already know that carpenter ants really love syrups, sugar, meats and other foodstuffs. Not only will they make a complete mess of your kitchen, but you will well be surprised in finding your foodstock coming down appreciably.
It is a point taken that these ants live pretty much in the open, but one of the best places you can find them is – a stock of decayed wood. This is where you will find carpenter ants jostling to make their own colony (Not that you would want to go there to see this).
Carpenter ants are a beautiful creation of this nature, at least by the way they inhabit, propagate, and multiply. At times though, they become nasty for our liking!!