Carpenter ants supposedly have an unpalatable bitter nutty taste despite being somewhat nutritious. In some parts of the world ants are a delicacy. As are roaches and crickets. No thank you.
Reminds me of someone I heard the story of having a serious black widow infestation. Tried extermination, tried one thing, tried another to no avail. Then got chickens and let them roam the back yard. Chickens ate em all. Never had a problem again.
Yep, my dad used to watch the nature shows where the people were digging grubs out and roasting them. As long as a cow,pig chicken or deer are walking around, I'll leave the bugs be.
It isn't much, but it's there. By the time it's ready for the fire, it's usually washed off or sun cooked...
I "usually" see at least a dozen or so every summer if I'm moving wood around. We generally move the winters stash in the wood shed in Sept/Oct time frame. I usually get one or two bites a year, I had a pretty good one this year on my index finger, two small perfect fang marks and sore!!! Felt very achy, nausea and slight feverish, that's the norm after the bite. I normally don't see them crawling on me till it's after the fact. Our area here is loaded with them. You would think I'd be smart and use gloves...
I’ve always tossed pieces that held ants off in another direction trying to keep the openings up towards the weather. Let the splits stay there a for a few days and they’ll be gone. Lately if I have a nest of ants in a split I’ll reach over the splitter and let the hot exhaust burn and blow them out. Figure if I kill enough of them the entire colony is doomed.
It's only real bad if your allergic to the bite, then you need to go get help. It does make you feel like complete $#!T for a day or so. I'll post my next bite, I'm sure to get one every summer. It looks like two little needle pokes about 1/16 across and it turns real red around the area. The bite feels very itchy and burning like, then you know the rest of the symptoms are coming. The fever is probably the suckiest part of it all, usually within a day your fine.
You got them there, I'm sure of it! There all over the U.S. They love "bug hide outs" wood piles and rocks!
I have the ants in cherry, hickory,ash, beech and maple. I just set those pieces to the side do they drown, hit them with a bernzomatic, or something else to kill them. I am afraid they will get to my house, so I surround my Year three pile at the house with some poison and dimataceous earth. Things are everywhere!
