Fire Ants ??

[n2ize]

Has anyone ever been bit by a fire ant ? Today (actually yesterday) I was out in park along the highway and I was sitting on a partially destroyed bench from a tree that had fallen on it a couple days ago. The tree was already cut up by county workers but the heavy wood it waiting for removal. All of a sudden I feel what felt like a red hot needle touch my arm. I looked and saw this tiny (about 2mm) long red ant on my arm. I swatted it off but I still got this large, like in 1.5 inch area that swelled up and itched. As a precaution I took an antihistamine (benedry...which also put me to sleep) and put an antihistamine gel on the wound. Now it's no longer swollen, just a little red and itchy in the area where the tiny critter bit me.

Does that sound like a fire ant ? I didn't think we had them this far north but I read that they can withstand cold weather reasonably well. I hear they are nasty fuckers if you happen to disturb one of their ant hills.

[W9WLS]

That sounds like a "Fire Ant" bite, or at least a close relative.
My Son in Middle Georgia has had them in his yard several times (mound's) , and yes they are nasty little buggers.
An antihistamine is the standard treatment for a (or multiple) bites , a product called "After-Bite" help's also , but otherwise your just stuck with it.
I have heard that they are migrating Northward and have heard report's of them in Western Kentucky and Southern Indiana here where I live but have not seen or heard of anyone locale here finding them YET .
There are an assortment of product's on the market for dealing with them which work to rid your yard of them, but the standard "Red-neck" treatment is to apply several gallons of gasoline around and on the mound (hill) .

[NY4Q]

All of a sudden I feel what felt like a red hot needle touch my arm. I looked and saw this tiny (about 2mm) long red ant on my arm.

Sounds like a typical fire ant bite to me. Nasty critters. I'm glad they can't fly!

[KK4AMI]

I had a training lesson on fire ants when I moved to North Carolina. Luckily it was from my neighbor and not the ants. We had a mound in the yard. She showed me the poison to get to kill the whole colony and the queen.

[n0km]

We have red ants that you really want to avoid getting stung by. However, when it happens, a paste made from baking soda and water applied to the wound seems to help.

[n2ize]

I got three bites. One small one a couple of inches above the wrist. That one is a small red bump and only itches if I touch it. The other two are very close together and just below the elbow and they itch like hell, worst than any mosquito bite or poison ivy that I ever had. The skin surrounding the bite area is also a little red. From what I read some species of fire ants do indeed live this far north and even further north than here. I was in the area of a recently felled tree when I got the bites. Could be they had a nest in or around the tree and it got disturbed when the tree fell and was later cut up. Stinking tiny little red ant no more than 1 to 2 millimeters long had sure got some POTENT medicine inside of it..... BTW I encountered the ants on county property about a quarter mile from where I live. Well, if nothing else I now have one more reason to hate summer.

[n2ize]

We have red ants that you really want to avoid getting stung by. However, when it happens, a paste made from baking soda and water applied to the wound seems to help.

Thanks for the suggestion. They also recommend that for poison ivy. I am going to see if we have any sodium bicarbonate around and give that a go. So far I have been using Benadryl gel and also taking Benadryl orally. The oral benadryl tends to make me sleepy though.Then again, being sleepy ain't so bad.
Earlier this summer I had poison ivy.


I think I'll spend the rest of this summer in nice cool indoor air conditioned spaces and I'll suspend all outdoor activity until sometime after the first frost or, the first snow.

[PA5COR]

No red or fire ants here, though the wasps are getting a nuisance now, we have lots more as last year here....

[WØTKX]

You have been infected. Prepare to be assimilated.

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51wO7TUhb5L.jpg


https://vimeo.com/37763447

What a great Michael Jackson cover!

[n0km]

I use a product called AMDRO on any anthills I find near the house. It usually takes overnight after application before there is a lack of activity. Quite a bit slower than the Cyanide based ant-killer stuff I had access to as a kid......

[NY4Q]

I was spray-washing the driveway today and now have five fire ant bites on my legs. As I would blast the edges of the driveway, I'd splatter one up on my leg every now and than and BAM!

[WØTKX]

Fire ants (the real ones) are nasty as hell. Got chewed up badly sleeping under the stars camping in New Mexico on a motorcycle trip. The multiple bites under the armpit sucked. There are a lot of ants that bite. Bastids. No wait, the workers are females. :mrgreen:

[NQ6U]

Fire ants (the real ones) are nasty as hell. Got chewed up badly sleeping under the stars camping in New Mexico on a motorcycle trip. The multiple bites under the armpit sucked. There are a lot of ants that bite. Bastids. No wait, the workers are females. :mrgreen:

Bastidettes.

[n2ize]

Well so far I haven't gotten any worst. My arm is still a little red and swollen at the site of the bites. And they still itch like hell. Like I said earlier, for a tiny 1 - 2 millimeter size ant they sure pack some strong medicine. Too bad it's unpleasant. Why can't nature make a bug that bites and gets you high for 3 or 4 days instead of making you miserable,,,

[NQ6U]

Well so far I haven't gotten any worst. My arm is still a little red and swollen at the site of the bites. And they still itch like hell. Like I said earlier, for a tiny 1 - 2 millimeter size ant they sure pack some strong medicine. Too bad it's unpleasant. Why can't nature make a bug that bites and gets you high for 3 or 4 days instead of making you miserable,,,

No evolutionary advantage, in the Darwinian sense.

[n2ize]

Just an update. My arm is clearing up. Swelling has gone down and the large swollen hot area of redness has subsided and cooled down to normal. Just more or less a few red bumps that I guess will take time to heal. I now have a deep respect for fire ants. Nasty and potent little tiny critters.

[WØTKX]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TgqF-ND2XcY

[K4PIH]

Fire ants also have another nasty suprise besides bites. They also have stingers similar to wasps and ut's a one/two punch. They bite and sting. The bite hurts but the real cause of the bumps and the swelling is the venom in their stinger.

[ka4dpo]

We had fire ants in Florida and they really suck. One day I was mowing the lawn in flip flops and ran over a fire ant mound, that was the first time I had ever seen one. They stung the crap out of me and believe me it hurts a lot. So I did what anyone would in a situation like that, I grabbed the gas can and made a roman candle out of their mound. The St Augustine grass grew back soon enough and I found some poison that controlled them, sent them packing to the neighbors yards.

[K0RGR]

The only nice thing about living on the edge of the frozen tundra is that we don't have an overabundance of little nasties like that. They couldn't compete with the skeeters and worse yet, no-see-ums up here. We do have these huge carpenter ants, and I keep spraying around my place to get rid of them. We closed up some openings, and I haven't seen any in the house, since, but they do patrol the outside. Those are like termites - they eat wood. Up north, they have there horrible black flies. The little boogers bite you, and make a hole big enough to stick their whole head in, which will shortly become infected and itch like the fleas of 1,000 camels. I avoid the north in blackfly season.

I remember parking outside Winnemucca, NV one time, and as far as the eye could see, there were huge anthills full of red ants. The desert must be full of them in that region.

[n2ize]

For several years I used to get large carpenter ants in my bedroom crossing from one end of the room to the other. There were a few mornings then I woke up with one crawling over me. Some of them were pretty darned big too. Finally the problem came to a head when we had a new roof installed on the house. The roofers discovered that there was a hole in the old roof allowing water to leak into the attic and soak the wood in the walls and above the ceiling. Next came a builder who tore down the entire outside wall of the room and part of the ceiling. The wood was rotted and made a perfect place for carpenter ants to nest. Finally when he was cutting through a part of the ceiling that needed to be replace his saw cut through the ants nest and the critters came raining down all over the place. The whole time the ants nest was right over my head. Now I have a new wall, new wood, new ceiling, new window and, best of all, no more carpenter ants.

[KØWVM]

Has anyone ever been bit by a fire ant ? Today (actually yesterday) I was out in park along the highway and I was sitting on a partially destroyed bench from a tree that had fallen on it a couple days ago. The tree was already cut up by county workers but the heavy wood it waiting for removal. All of a sudden I feel what felt like a red hot needle touch my arm. I looked and saw this tiny (about 2mm) long red ant on my arm. I swatted it off but I still got this large, like in 1.5 inch area that swelled up and itched. As a precaution I took an antihistamine (benedry...which also put me to sleep) and put an antihistamine gel on the wound. Now it's no longer swollen, just a little red and itchy in the area where the tiny critter bit me.

Does that sound like a fire ant ? I didn't think we had them this far north but I read that they can withstand cold weather reasonably well. I hear they are nasty fuckers if you happen to disturb one of their ant hills.

Living in Texas for a combined 9.5 years and a few years in NC, I have had my fair share (and then some) of Fire Ant stings. After the pain goes away, the itching thusly commences. They serve absolutely no purpose and were brought here from Africa via the stowaway route.

You see them or their mounds, destroy them with absolute prejudice! Ortho has many products for taking care of these pesky demons. They have been known to overtake a grown human and adult livestock by overwhelming with sheer numbers via stinging them to death.

[KØWVM]

For several years I used to get large carpenter ants in my bedroom crossing from one end of the room to the other. There were a few mornings then I woke up with one crawling over me. Some of them were pretty darned big too. Finally the problem came to a head when we had a new roof installed on the house. The roofers discovered that there was a hole in the old roof allowing water to leak into the attic and soak the wood in the walls and above the ceiling. Next came a builder who tore down the entire outside wall of the room and part of the ceiling. The wood was rotted and made a perfect place for carpenter ants to nest. Finally when he was cutting through a part of the ceiling that needed to be replace his saw cut through the ants nest and the critters came raining down all over the place. The whole time the ants nest was right over my head. Now I have a new wall, new wood, new ceiling, new window and, best of all, no more carpenter ants.

After my dad got stung by these demons (Fire Ants) in the late 70's in Texas, he declared total war on them. He decided to spray a solution of Chlordane, mixed with water back then and for several years we had practically no living pests attempting to or living within the confines of our property. Unfortunately, they no longer make Chlordane (as of 1988 because it was determined to be carcinogenic). Even termites stayed away from our home (neighbor had them in sides of his house) because they could detect it. A few scouts were brave enough to attempt to cross into our yard and were found dead within feet of the property line. Carpenter Ants left the trees in our yard to get away from the Chlordane. This stuff was no joke!

[n2ize]

After my dad got stung by these demons (Fire Ants) in the late 70's in Texas, he declared total war on them. He decided to spray a solution of Chlordane, mixed with water back then and for several years we had practically no living pests attempting to or living within the confines of our property. Unfortunately, they no longer make Chlordane (as of 1988 because it was determined to be carcinogenic). Even termites stayed away from our home (neighbor had them in sides of his house) because they could detect it. A few scouts were brave enough to attempt to cross into our yard and were found dead within feet of the property line. Carpenter Ants left the trees in our yard to get away from the Chlordane. This stuff was no joke!

I concur. I am very familiar with Chlordane and Isotox (an organophosphate similar in potency to Chlordane). These chemicals are nerve agents that derive their potency in a manner similar to the nave "nerve gas" works. Any yes indeed, they were extremely effective. When my parents moved to the suburbs they sprayed our entire backyard with Chlordane. My dad sprayed Chlordane into a back wall of the house to kill a nest of carpenter ants. All I remember was the ants dropping dead as soon as they got a whiff of the stuff. He also sprayed it on the base of a tree that was being attacked by ants. Very effective and potent stuff. In fact back in the late 1950's and 1960's many new homes being built Chlordane was poured into the ground before that laid down the foundation. This was a measure to reduce the liklihood of termites.

Here in New York State they started tightening up on the use of Chlordane some time during the 1980's. The last time my dad bought a can of Chlordane he was required to sign for it and it came with a state issued document declaring where and how it can be used and where and when it was prohibited. As you mentioned a few years later the state (and apparently the entire country) banned its use altogether along with Isotox, Lindane, etc.

These days my folks wouldn't use Chlordane even if they had it. In fact these days they are very anti-pesticide use.

[ka4dpo]

Living in Texas for a combined 9.5 years and a few years in NC, I have had my fair share (and then some) of Fire Ant stings. After the pain goes away, the itching thusly commences. They serve absolutely no purpose and were brought here from Africa via the stowaway route.

You see them or their mounds, destroy them with absolute prejudice! Ortho has many products for taking care of these pesky demons. They have been known to overtake a grown human and adult livestock by overwhelming with sheer numbers via stinging them to death.

Strange how all of the insects that were brought here from Africa are dangerous and they seem to like Texas, maybe it's the climate. I remember they had a seminar at FT Hood one time telling you what to do and what not to do if you encountered Africanized bees. They make fire ants look like amateurs and they used to be abundant around Bexar County. Talk about dangerous, a killer bee hive can kill 10 or 15 people in less than a minute. As for the fire ants, I used Diazenon almost full strength so I didn't have any pests either. Once in a while a mole cricket would pop out of the lawn and do a backflip but that was the end of them...

[K0RGR]

We have enough trouble with stingers around here without the Africanized bees.

A coworker of my wife's climbed up on his trailer to clean his air conditioner, and was nearly stung to death by wasps. The exterminator said it was the only time he ever saw two species of the varmits build nests in the same place. They were probably hostile before the guy got in the middle of it.

Another fellow found a wild beehive by accident and was nearly stung to death near here.

This is the time of year when the bees become heat-seeking, and apparently I must be very colorful in infrared, because they come from all over to check me out. It was worse in Iowa than it is here, thanks to our even longer winter, but I get tired of swatting at stinging critters.

[n2ize]

Just for the record my fire ant bites have long cleared up. No more pain or itching skin. Just 2 tiny fading red bumps where the actual bites occurred.

[KG4NEL]

Strange how all of the insects that were brought here from Africa are dangerous and they seem to like Texas, maybe it's the climate. I remember they had a seminar at FT Hood one time telling you what to do and what not to do if you encountered Africanized bees.

The little flying assholes around here used to hover over a road I ran on, and would follow me for damn near a half mile before giving up...

[n2ize]

You don't want to tangle with a nest full of these critters, or even one of them for that matter.

14255

Moar here

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asian_giant_hornet

[WØTKX]

Somebody stuck a pin thru its thorax.

[KØWVM]

You don't want to tangle with a nest full of these critters, or even one of them for that matter.

14255

Moar here

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asian_giant_hornet

They are in Europe now (France), where it has killed one person already. Stowaway on a freighter from China... Now there are fears that it's not a matter of IF, but when they arrive to the US... unless they are already here and nobody is aware of what these things are, other than a larger than normal wasp.

[K4PIH]

I've seen those in Japan and you can hear them coming before you see them. Quite a loud buzz as they fly by, hopefully!

[kb2vxa]

When they come we are ready... to send them fire ants.

[n2ize]

They are in Europe now (France), where it has killed one person already. Stowaway on a freighter from China... Now there are fears that it's not a matter of IF, but when they arrive to the US... unless they are already here and nobody is aware of what these things are, other than a larger than normal wasp.

I live in Southeastern New York and one day I was sitting in our backyard and this huge hornet starts hovering right in front of me. Let's just say he/she was hovering close enough in front of my face to give me a good look at her colors, eyes, etc. She looked exactly like one of these. I checked out pictures of European hornets and other large hornets but none of them matched what I saw. The closest match was this critter. She hovered in front of me for a few more seconds and then flew up over the roof and off into the wild blue yonder. Never saw another one since. So who knows, maybe they are already here.

[kb2vxa]

.

[K4PIH]

We have some pretty big ones in the US, but not many that are up to 3 inches long.

[WØTKX]

http://www.anthillart.com/castings/072/


(http://www.anthillart.com/castings/072/)http://www.anthillart.com/castings/073/pictures/front-img_6194_bt.jpg

[n2ize]

Latest update. I seem to have a mild cellulitis infection on the arm where my fire ant bites occurred. I took some SMZ/TMP and I'll see what it looks like in the morning. If not and since it's a holiday I'll be off to the ER to have it checked. Bitch !!!

[ka4dpo]

I was looking for this for this a while back and finally came across it. These are Asian Hornets and they are particularly nasty if you run into even one of them. They have been known to kill people and do in fact kill several people a year in China and the far east.

14277

[KØWVM]

I was looking for this for this a while back and finally came across it. These are Asian Hornets and they are particularly nasty if you run into even one of them. They have been known to kill people and do in fact kill several people a year in China and the far east.

14277

Where were these little devils found?

[KG4CGC]

When they come we are ready... to send them fire ants.

No. Wasps and hornets are capable of communicating to fire ants and will send them to you.
Last week I was killing wasps. I was nowhere near a fire ant mound. I always look. 10 minutes later there were fire ants biting my toes.
Again, no mounds anywhere near by. Fire ants will not bend to your will just because you say so.

[ka4dpo]

Where were these little devils found?

I think they were found in Taiwan.

[n2ize]

All I know is instead of going to a Labor Day barbecue at my brothers place I wound up in the local ER being treated for an arm infection from those fire ants. After the allergic reaction subsided I was left with a mild soreness along the veins of my arm that slowly got worst and worst and started getting hot & red. In the ER they checked for a blood clot and that was negative so then they saw my WBC count was elevated and treated me with an oral course of Vibramyacin. I am doing a lot better now. Only a tiny bit of soreness left and I still have about 2-3 days of antibiotic left to go.

[n2ize]

I was looking for this for this a while back and finally came across it. These are Asian Hornets and they are particularly nasty if you run into even one of them. They have been known to kill people and do in fact kill several people a year in China and the far east.

14277


They look tasty. Looks like they would make for some good eatin.