Carpenter Ants

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Carpenter Ants are a nuisance in any part of your home, especially in the kitchen, bathroom, living room and bedrooms. Carpenter Ants do not eat wood, but often remove quantities of it to expand their nest size. There are several species of Carpenter Ants although they all may be generally identified as ants that are black, or red and black, and range in size from 3/8" to 1/2" long. Winged queen ants may be as large as 1" long.

If you discover large numbers of Carpenter ants in your home, the nest is probably nearby. If you notice only one to three of the worker ants aimlessly moving about they may be only foraging for food, and far from the nest. If left untreated Carpenter Ants will gladly move into your home and build a large nest. The ability to be protected from the weather, and have an abundant food source will allow them to quickly multiply throughout your home. Treating Carpenter Ants needs to be handled by a professional in order to kill not only the workers that you see, but to also kill the nest and the queen Carpenter Ant.

Carpenter Ant Identification

Carpenter ants are among the largest ants found in Georgia. Winged queens are much larger than winged males. Wingless queens measure 5/8" long, winged queens 3/4" long, small workers about 1/4" long and large workers up to 1/2" long. Workers are basically brown, while queen ants are black. Workers have large heads and a small thorax, however adult swarmers have a smaller head and large thorax. Carpenter ants have a smoothly rounded arched shape to the top of the thorax when viewed from the side and a pedicel between the thorax and abdomen consisting of only one segment or node. Adults are usually black, however some species show red, brown or yellow occurring on parts of the body and legs. Eggs are about 1/8" long, cream colored and oval.

Life Cycle and Habits

Winged male and female carpenter ants (swarmers) emerge from mature colonies usually from March to July. After mating, males die and newly fertilized females (mated for life), establish a new colony in a small cavity in wood, under bark, etc. and each lays 15 to 20 eggs in 15 days. The egg stage takes about 24 days, larval stage 21 days and pupal stage 21 days or about 65 days from egg to adult in warmer months. A mature colony (2-3 years) usually has 2,000 to 4,000 ants, and is continually growing. The few workers emerging from the first brood assume general duties of the ant colony, including food collection, creating naviagtion tunnels to enlarge the nest, tending eggs, larvae and pupae. The queen's primary role is to lay more eggs.

Larger workers guard the nest, and forage for food. Smaller workers expand the nest and care for larvae and juvenile ants. When the nest is disturbed the workers immediately carry the larvae and pupa to a safe location. All worker ants have strong jaws and will deliver a stinging bite for defense.

Carpenter Ant nests are usually established in soft, moist, decayed wood, or sometimes in a dry wood cavity. Workers cut tunnels throughout the wood to allow for expanding the nest size and colony size. These tunnels (galleries) are irregular, usually going with the wood grain into softer portions of the wood. The walls of the nest are smooth and clean with shredded sawdust-like wood fragments carried out of the nest.

Carpenter ants do not eat wood. Carpenter ants use take aphids to nearby plants, and place them on leaves for the production of honey dew. The food diet includes both plant and animal sources such as fruits, insects, honey, sugar, syrup, grease, and honey dew. The most favorable characteristic of Carpenter Ants is that they will devour termites.

The following links will take you to pages with information on other common types of ants in Georgia.

Getting rid of Carpenter Ants can be very difficult for the average home owner because they are highly resilient to many any sprays. Getting rid of Carpenter Ants in your home may require both indoor and outdoor ant control treatments, as well as some well placed home improvement work to block their return. Our ant control specialists can eliminate your Carpenter Ant problem and give you ideas on how to ant-proof your home. Call us today!