How to Win the War Against Ants

Proclaiming victory in my wife’s and my battle against an invasion of ants might be premature at this point in time.  A better title may be “How We Have Won Battles Against Ants,” but the “How to Win the War…” is definitely better click bait about ant bait.  Superior SEO, high-caliber key words, and so on and so forth.

Wait, don’t click to something else yet, unless you want to click on an ad and purchase something.

I cannot claim having participated much in these skirmishes throughout our home over the past few years.  I am more of an observer who occasionally helps as directed.  I am good at moral support, assuring my wife that no matter how clean our kitchen is, the ants are still going to find a way in to seek out food.  One thing I have to give to the ants is their work ethic and determination.  They don’t give up.  Actually, they exhibit many of the character traits that humans spend years striving for.  But we still want to kill the ones that make their way into our home.

The product that my wife has purchased is Terro, and that stuff works like a charm.

I should have called this post "How To Terro-Rize Ants," but I do not want the alphabet soup of federal law enforcement agencies to misconstrue the pun.  Maybe when this blog, or my next one, gains in popularity I will re-post it with that title.  

My better half spreads drops of the stuff in an area frequented by the swarms of ants, hours later the drops are covered in hundreds of ants, who dutifully bring droplets of the stuff back to their colony, not realizing that it is poison that they are ingesting and bringing back to share.

Had I written this post a few weeks ago after it appeared that we had won a decisive victory at the Battle of the Middle Stair leading to the basement, it would have been misleading.  Little did we know that the ants were regrouping and making their way to our corner cabinet, home to an abundance of candy, chocolate, seasonings and our fancier eating implements. 

My wife was completely grossed out last week to find some chocolate covered in ants.  After discarding it, she strategically placed another Post-It note covered in three drops of Terro right at the ants’ primary gathering place. 

Knowing that I write these posts, she urged me to photograph it.  Here it is, as well as some video in case you do not believe that we have an infestation of ants, although why in the world someone would write that they do if they do not is beyond my comprehension.

Tonight, she urged me to take another photo to show how well this stuff works.  It is leading us toward another victory in our ongoing war against the ants that we have waged the past several springs.

There are zero ants present today.

Our family spends thousands and thousands per month.  As a matter of fact, nearly $33,000 left our checking account to pay for things and invest during the first quarter of this year.  But that is a subject for another post.

The five bucks that my wife spent on Terro at Target was just one insignificant purchase over those months that included three college tuition payments, three mortgage payments and one property tax payment, several thousand dollars’ worth of investing, two trips to Disney World by family members and a week spent in NOLA with me and my son.

But it was a significant purchase nonetheless.

Especially if it constitutes all the spending on the war that we continue waging against the Invasion of the Ants.