Homemade Ant Killers: Recipes & Tips

When trying to get rid of ants, it’s helpful to first have a basic understanding how ants live and thrive:

Ants live in colonies and one class of ant within the colony is the worker/gatherer/forager. Worker ants make up approximately 10% of the colony and it’s their job to go out, find and collect food then bring it back to feed the rest of the colony.

Ants are mainly looking for two things: food and water. If it’s getting cold outside, they also like to settle in to find shelter. Below I’ve listed various home remedies and solutions for ant control (along with some tidbits of information on ant behavior and habits).

Getting Rid Of Ants

List Of Homemade Spray Cleaner Recipes

Clean countertops and surfaces well with one of the cleaners below, these can also be used to spray ants directly.

• Vinegar
• Vinegar & Water (50/50 mix)
• Cider Vinegar & Water (50/50 mix)
• One of these essential oils: Peppermint, Lavender, Eucalyptus, Tea Tree Oil, Witch Hazel Extract (1 tablespoon) plus water–per spray bottle
• Liquid Dish Detergent & Water (about 1 tablespoon detergent, fill spray bottle with water).

Did You Know: Ants leave a scented trail for each other so they can easily find their way back to the jackpot (the food source in your home). Trails can be both visible and invisible to human eyes, but ants can follow the trails with ease. Washing away these trails will confuse them and make it more difficult to find their favorite places. Making your own cleaners with the above ingredients also adds a repellent that ants will avoid.

Baiting The Ants

When you provide a tempting treat to the ant that is actually poison (known as ant bait), you want to make sure it’s not too strong that it will kill the ant before it gets back to the colony (sometimes ants are gone for days), and that it’s not too weak that it’s ineffective. You want poisoned food brought back to the nest for the rest of the colony to ingest.

The type of food an ant looks for is either sugar or protein, it depends on what the needs of the colony are at the time. This is why a “tried and true” ant killer recipe that came highly recommended doesn’t work for you, the bait holds no interest for the ants in your home.

Tip: First determine if the ants in your house are after sugar or protein. Leave a sample of each bait out and see which ones the ants go for. Once you’ve determined what they’re hungry for, set out a few baits with their choice.

Homemade Ant Bait Recipes

Sugar Bait

2 TBS Boric Acid (Borax)
Jam (or Jelly, Honey, Maple Syrup)

• Mix the boric acid with the jam or jelly to make a paste. Slather it on a piece of paper, a plate or in a covered container with holes. You may have to adjust amount of Boric Acid if the ants seem to eat up the bait like crazy, but are getting fatter from it instead of dying.

Sugar Bait

2 cups Sugar
1 cup Water
2 TBS Boric Acid (Borax)

• Mix and place in small saucers around the home.

Protein Bait

2 TBS Boric Acid (Borax)
Peanut Butter or Bacon Grease

• Mix and set out in mounds on pieces of paper or plates.

Sugar Bait

1 cup Confectioners Sugar
2 TBS Boric Acid (Borax)

• Leave this in little mounds or in covered containers with holes.

Sugar Bait

2 TBS Molasses
1 TBS Yeast
1 TBS Sugar

• Mix and place mounds on paper, plates or in covered containers with holes.

Important: When baiting the ants to bring poison back to the nest, resist the temptation to kill them when you see them. You want them to live and take big juicy pieces of poisoned bait back to the nest for the rest of the colony to feast on.

Baiting Tips:

• Boric Acid can be harmful if swallowed. If you have kids or pets in the home, set the bait in covered plastic containers with a few holes poked in the sides. You could also use glass jars sealed with lids–just poke holes in the top lid. For strong attraction, smear a bit of non-poisoned bait on top of the lid so the ants find it easily.
• For best results lay out fresh bait daily.
• Lay the bait in areas where you see regular ant activity and near their points of entry if you know them.
• Don’t be diligent washing away the ant trails, you want them to find the bait spots easily again and again. All the worker ants in the colony can follow each others trails, so even if you killed off the first foragers, their partners will follow the trail they left.
• You may find that a sugar bait will be popular for a few days, then a protein bait is needed as the ants switch to protein foods. Change your bait method as needed.
• If you’ve set out both types of bait (sugar and protein) yet the ants are attracted to neither, reduce the amount of boric acid used until they starting feasting on the bait.

Did You Know: If a colony senses something is up when its members start dying and begins to feel stressed, the Queen Ant will likely give orders for the colony to split up into a few smaller colonies, trying to preserve as many members as she can. This is why it may take several days of laying out fresh ant bait regularly–you’re trying to get enough poison into all the colonies to wipe out the whole lot.

Killing Ants By Destroying Their Nests

Find the ant nest and pour one of the following solutions into it. Cover your legs and wear rubber boots if possible, the ants will be streaming out of the nest while you’re doing this.

Nest Destroying Methods:

• 1/4 cup liquid dish detergent per gallon of boiling water (add soap after water has been removed from heat). This will likely kill surrounding grass and plants. (Good remedy for fire ants).
• Pour large amounts of cider vinegar down inside the ant hill. Do this around the surrounding area as well, for at least three days. Will likely kill plants and grass too.
• Bring water to a boil, mix in salt to make a strong salt solution and pour down nest. Repeat over three days (and pour over surrounding area as well to prevent ants from rebuilding in the area).
• Disturb their home regularly: Flood the ant hill with lots of water (just use the garden hose and let the water run for awhile). Do this daily for at least a week or two. The ants will get fed up and move.

Tips:

• Ants can live submerged in water for several days so you need to using boiling hot water to kill them. Pouring boiling hot water into the nest is effective on its own but you could also try adding an ingredient (as shown above) to make the remedy more powerful.
• Pour slowly into nest so the water has time to get into all the tunnels and surrounding soil. Do three times the first day, then at least once a day for the next three days.
• The best time to do this is when the ants are moving up closer to the earth’s surface (when it’s not too hot or cool). Typically between 10 a.m. and noon on a sunny day is the best time.
• You could also try liberally covering the mound with one of the ant repellents listed below (cinnamon, salt, etc.).

Not Advised:

• Pouring kerosene or gasoline on the nest used to be a common method for killing the ant colony, but it’s not only dangerous it’s also harmful for the surrounding soil.

Did You Know: Ants not only build their colonies outside, they can also setup house inside. If you see small ant hills inside your home, vacuum them up (and dispose vacuum contents in sealed plastic bags immediately). If a large nest has been built inside your home, this is a good time to bring in an exterminator.

• Tip: If it’s winter (below freezing) and your home has ants, you likely have a nest inside the house.

Controlling Ants Inside The Home

The first line of defense is making your home unattractive to ants. Make sure to wipe up spills immediately and wipe off counters, tables and stovetops regularly leaving no crumbs behind. Sweep and wash floors regularly. Don’t leave dirty dishes around the house or in the sink. Keep dry foods (like flour, cereal, sugar, oats, etc.) in air tight containers. Take out garbage regularly and wash out all food packaging and pop bottles before putting in the recycle bin.

Although a sloppy home will attract ants, having ants in your home doesn’t necessarily mean you’re a poor housekeeper–the ants could be after water. If it’s dry outside and there’s not a nearby water source, ants will be in your home on the hunt for water. They’ll find it in houseplants, sinks and drains, pet water dishes and cups left out containing liquids.

List Of Natural Ant Repellents

Look for cracks or holes in the house where the ants are coming from, spread any of these repellents around the holes (or combination of items on the list). Also spread around window sills, along baseboards, in corners and outside doors. The theory is that since ants are repelled by these items, they’ll turn back. Success of the repellents can depend on the species of ants in your home.

• Cinnamon
• Ground Black Pepper
• Bay Leaves
• Whole Cloves
• Red Chili Powder (sprinkle liberally or make a paste with water and apply at entrance)
• Red Pepper Flakes
• Salt
• Used Coffee Grounds
• Sage
• Cucumber Peels
• Essential Oils: Peppermint, Lavender, Eucalyptus. Swab these around entrance points.

Tip: Plugging holes and cracks with caulking or filling with vaseline will physically block the ants from entering.

Food Barriers

The ants could be attracted to your pet’s food dish, a potted plant or dish of candies. Either keep food sealed until needed or surround it with a water barrier so the ants can’t get to the food. Fill a baking pan with water and set the pet food dish (or potted plant, etc.), in the middle. Mixing in a little liquid dish detergent with the water will be a strong repellent as well as prevent the water from becoming a water source for the ants.

If it’s a potted plant that’s infested with ants, repot the plant in a fresh pot of soil, washing roots clean of previous soil. You can try submerging the pot in a bucket of water for about 15 minutes to make the ants flee, but this won’t remove larvae that may be present.

Natural Outdoor Ant Deterrents

Look for entry ways into the home via tree branches touching the house (including the roof), drain pipes, outdoor plants, shrubs, etc., trim these back if possible. Otherwise, wrap branches and pipes with a sticky substance that will trap the ants before they enter the home (duct tape facing sticky side out should do it).

If your house exterior will tolerate it without staining (test a small area first), spray a mixture of liquid dish detergent and water around the foundation of the home. There will be a soap residue left on the surface as the water evaporates, hopefully enough to deter the ants from crossing it. Straight vinegar sprayed on the ground around the house can help too (both methods may harm grass and plants).

• Mint: Plant fresh mint around the foundation of the house (can also have potted inside), or sprinkle crushed mint around entrances.
• Tansy, Lavender & Sage: Plant as mint above.
• Mix cloves and ground pepper with flour (3 TBS spice to 1 cup flour) and spread around areas that have heavy ant activity, this will help scatter them. Do this when there’s no sign of rain.
• Diatomaceous Earth: (can also use inside the home) Nice, non-toxic pesticide that is pet & child friendly. Probably the most effective naturally occurring protective powder, this is a great option if the ant nest is underneath a deck or patio and sidewalk blocks. Sprinkle this in the cracks that the ants will have to crawl up through. Diatomaceous Earth is easily picked up by the hairy bodies of most insects, whereupon it scratches through their protective wax layers and they also absorb some of this material. The result being that the insects lose water rapidly, dry up and die. Further protection is provided by the powder’s property of repelling many insects. In houses it can be used effectively to prevent the entry of certain insects such as earwigs, ants, and cockroaches, and to control these and others that are present in cupboards containing food, carpets, basements, attics, window ledges, pet areas (for fleas), etc. In all of these examples it is important to place a small amount of the powder in corners, cracks, crevices and other areas where insects might hide. Source: Ecological Agriculture Projects, McGill University.

Old Wives Tale: Make a 1″ line of chalk or baby powder (talcum) around the home, ants won’t cross it. Does it work? Many swear that it does.

False Ant Killers

• Aspartame: Touted frequently online as originally being developed as an ant poison and an effective way to control carpenter ants. Snopes found this to be false, see: The World’s Best Ant Poison.
• Instant Grits & Exploding Ants: One popular online ant remedy recommended is to feed ants instant grits, instant oatmeal, cornmeal, cream of wheat or couscous. It’s suggested that ants will “explode” when the food would expand inside them as it comes in contact with stomach fluids. A study on the instant grits method and fire ants was done and found to be ineffective, here is the report: Laboratory Assay of Effect of Instant Grits and Malt-O-Meal for Imported Fire Ant Control. Also read the info below, it’s highly unlikely that the adult ants would even be able to eat the grits as they’re too large.

Did you know: Ants carry solid food particles back to the nest to feed the colony’s larvae, the larvae then processes the food and turns it into a liquid to feed the adult ants. Adult ants can ingest very tiny, minuscule particles of food (larger pieces are filtered out), but their diet is from the liquid that the larvae provides.

Controlling Ants vs Killing Them

Think ants are pests? They may be if they’re taking over your home, but outside they’re very much needed. They aerate the soil, clean up scraps and seeds, control termite populations and they’re a food source for birds and other insects. As with all creatures, they play an important part in a healthy planet.

If you prefer encouraging the ants to move elsewhere instead of killing them, make your home their last choice for foraging by using the above ant control methods and tips.

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