How To Keep Ants Out of Your Shreveport Home This Spring

Know Your Enemy: Common Ants in Shreveport

Argentine Ants

Argentine ants are small, black ants that frequently enter homes in search of food or moisture. They thrive in moist environments, often nesting near water-damaged wood or around the warmth and moisture of plumbing fixtures. Argentine ants can form huge colonies. If they enter your house, you will most likely find them in your kitchen or bathroom.

Carpenter Ants

Carpenter ants are large ants that can be black, red, or a combination of the two colors. Although they don’t eat wood, they do build their nests in it. This causes damage to the wooden structures they infest, as they chew through the wood to dig tunnels and create nesting areas. Carpenter ants prefer damp, decaying wood, but can infest hard, sound wood.

Fire Ants

Fire ants are tiny red ants that usually remain outdoors. They build ant mounds in sunny yards. These ants are aggressive and will defend their nests against any threat, real or perceived. If you accidentally disturb their nest, you will quickly be covered in red ant stings, which can be extremely painful. They can also be dangerous for people with weakened immune systems.

Pharaoh Ants

Pharaoh ants are tiny ants with light brown bodies. They are best known for infesting hospitals and other medical buildings and spreading diseases from patient to patient. Pharaoh ants also get into homes and will most often nest inside walls. In addition to spreading harmful disease-causing pathogens, they can also cause damage when they nest on or near electrical equipment and wiring.

Rover Ants

Rover ants are small ants that can be light or dark in color. They prefer to remain outdoors, but sometimes end up inside when foraging for food. If they enter your home, you’ll likely find them in your kitchen or storage areas. Rover ants are mainly considered a nuisance pest. They can contaminate your food, but don’t cause serious health or property risks.

Spring Prevention Tips: Keep Ants Outdoors Where They Belong

The best way to avoid problems caused by ants is to keep them off your property. The following prevention tips will discourage ant activity this spring.

Seal Entry Points

Check for cracks around windows, doors, and your home's foundation. Use caulk or weatherstripping to seal these openings. If you have tears or holes in window or door screens, repair or replace them.

Eliminate Food Sources

Ants most often head indoors in search of food. Eliminating food sources will make it less likely that they’ll return. To do this, store all food items in sealed containers. Don’t leave any food out on your counters. Transfer pantry items that come in paper or cardboard packaging into glass or plastic containers.

It’s also essential to keep your kitchen clean. Wipe your counters after cooking or eating. Wash your dishes or place them in the dishwasher immediately after a meal. Take out the trash regularly.

Reduce Moisture

Many ant species prefer moist environments. You must watch for any moisture issues in your house and address them as soon as they’re discovered. Look for leaking pipes and dripping faucets. Check for condensation around sinks and toilets. Use dehumidifiers in bathrooms, basements, crawl spaces, and other areas that tend to get humid.

Outside, ensure proper drainage that pulls moisture away from your house. If you don’t have gutters, install them and ensure eaves, twigs, and other debris do not clog them.

Keep the Yard Tidy

Removing items and vegetation around your house that can help ants more easily get in will help reduce the chances of an ant infestation. Trim shrubs, bushes, and tree branches that touch the sides or roof of your house. Avoid stacking firewood directly against your home, and clear lawn debris and clutter from around your yard, especially around the exterior perimeter of your house.

Already Seeing Ants in Shreveport? Here’s How to Take Control

If you see ants in your house, it’s easy to immediately take care of the ones you see and hope that’s all you have to do. Unfortunately, ants are intelligent. When they find a good food source, they create a pheromone trail that tells other ants where to get the food. A good way to start taking control of your ant problem is to disrupt the ant trails by cleaning the areas where you saw ants with vinegar spray. However, this is only a temporary fix.

To truly take care of your ant issue, you must take care of the entire ant colony. By eliminating the ants at their source, you can be certain that they won’t return to bother you or damage your home. The best way to take control of your ant problem is by contacting the professional pest control experts at Anti-Pest.

Anti-Pest’s Expert Ant Control Plan

Anti-Pest has been helping homeowners in Shreveport and surrounding areas address ant problems for over 70 years. Our home pest control plan covers all of the ants mentioned above, even fire ants, which most pest control companies require homeowners to pay extra to handle! We’ll take care of the ants that are already present and provide ongoing treatments to ensure no new ants show up. In addition to ant control, our home pest control covers over 20 other common pests.

Contact Anti-Pest For Effective Ant Control In Shreveport

Contact Anti-Pest if you want help ensuring that ants don’t get into your Shreveport home this spring or any other time of the year. We will take care of any active issues quickly and effectively, delivering the preventative services you need to keep your home ant-free, no matter the season. Contact us for an instant quote today.