In the News - May 2009
Boiling Water: Miracle treatment, scientific tool or another crazy idea?
HAMPTON, Ark. - Over the years, Arkansas residents have tried many schemes to
rid themselves of fire ants. Some ideas are just downright dangerous to the
environment such as pouring bleach, ammonia, petroleum products or other non-EPA
approved materials on mounds.
Farmers have used large rollers pulled behind tractors to flatten the ants’
large mounds in the fields. But fire ants are resilient and their mound tunnels
go surprising deep into the earth so they get back into business before you know
it.
Ant bait products are still the weapon of choice recommended by the
University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture.
But Jaret Rushing is impressed with one control method that hasn’t been
talked about much - boiling water.
"At one point in time, I thought that poison, poison, poison, was the best
way to knock back fire ants," said Rushing, Calhoun County extension agent with
the U of A Division of Agriculture.
"As an agent, we get calls all the time dealing with some odd questions and
methods of control," he said. So when Manuela Koinig, a graduate student at the
University of Arkansas at Little Rock, asked if I knew of any remote places to
conduct a fire ant study and mentioned that she planned to use boiling water as
part of her research project, he raised an eyebrow.
"I thought I had heard of some interesting fire ant control tactics, but this
one was new to me." Being a graduate student himself, he could sympathize, and
he agreed to help.
Armed with two 30-gallon tubs of water and a fish cooker, the two drove to an
air field and began heating water. They used 3 gallons of boiling water on each
mound and watched the ants perish. They treated the mounds again a week later.
The effects were impressive. The mounds disappeared and the ants were gone.
"Before everyone starts thinking that this was a miracle treatment, I will
say that plots were only 4 meters by 4 meters, which is not a long way for ants
to migrate to another mound," Rushing said. After secondary fire ant counts, he
said Koinig concluded that the mound treatments did have a positive effect on
the control of the ants.
Rushing said if done right, pouring boiling water on mounds can provide
control of fire ants in a centralized location. As a negative, boiling water
will kill grasses and other plants if poured directly onto the vegetation. Also,
heating water to a boil takes time and would not be feasible for large scale
control of fire ants
If a farmer or homeowner is considering using the tactic, he or she should
consider if treating individual mounds with boiling water is worth their time
and worth killing grass and other vegetation around the mounds.
Dr. John Hopkins, urban extension entomologist, said the big drawback to
using boiling water is the danger to people using it. He said there is a risk of
accidentally burning yourself while using boiling water.
While people have used "anything toxic they can find in the house" on mounds,
the main problem is environmental contamination, Hopkins said.
"Home remedies are rarely successful in the long term and usually only cause
the colony to move," he said.
Ant baits are recommended because ants distribute the product throughout the
mound. Retreatment at 10-14 days after the initial application is recommended
for any mounds that are still hanging on.
Hopkins was familiar with the UALR research project because he was the one
who recommended boiling water. "It was a scientific tool in a research study to
eliminate fire ants from a small specific area."
For more information on the control of fire ants, contact your county
extension agent. The Cooperative Extension Service is a part of the U of A
Division of Agriculture.
May 29, 2009
Media Contact: Lamar James
Extension Communications Specialist
U of A Division of Agriculture
Cooperative Extension Service
(501) 671-2187
ljames@uaex.edu
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