Texas Being Invaded By Ants

I'd barely finished a long-winded blogging about Seattle when I discovered I was facing my worst ant invasion of the year. This dwarfed last week's invasion.

I was sitting in the living room, when I looked out the patio window to see a line of ants moving on the wall. I followed the line up, then across the room, around the corner. And into my kitchen.

I grabbed my new can of almost empty ant spray and started exterminating the pests. I began at the patio door, because that appeared to be their entry point. By the time I got to the kitchen I saw they were swarming by my popcorn bowl, which sits on the shelf on top of the cabinets.

I grabbed the bowl. It was full of ants. I guess they like Parmesan cheese. I put the bowl in the sink and flushed them down the drain. It was disgusting. I turned on the disposal to make sure none survived.

This summer is looking to be a bad one, ant-wise. How can I leave this place un-attended by a responsible adult for a month? I could return to a total infestation.

Below is a video that shows you just how bad it is getting in Texas, ant-wise.

Texas Ant Invasion

We have ants here in Texas. Lots of ants. The two types with whom I've had close contact are fire ants and sugar ants. This morning I was greeted by an army of sugar ants that had invaded my kitchen, occupying one wall and one counter top.

Counter measures were immediately called for. I got out my can of Kitchen Safe Bug Spray and began the counter attack.

But my can of spray ran out before I'd finished killing all the ants that needed to die. So, I hurried out of here and made fast for Home Depot for a fresh can of extermination spray.

By the time I got back here the survivors of my first attack appeared to be in full retreat. Even so, I unleashed a fresh barrage on the remaining ants, killing all of them.

I then had to remove all the ant corpses and clean off all the contaminated surfaces. Grueling, nasty business.

Lulu told me her friend, Linda, now spending her first summer in Texas, having moved here from fire ant-free Washington, stepped on a fire ant mound a couple days ago and got stung severely. Apparently Linda was unaware of the fire ant danger we are constantly faced with in Texas.

I fear it's gonna be a really bad ant season this summer due to the new drought. Last summer there was a short plague of ants getting in the pool. That was not pleasant. They were big.

There are more ants on the planet than any other creature. Ants are estimated to make up 15 to 20% of Earth's total animal biomass. That's a lotta ants. I've done my part to reduce the ant population by a few ounces this morning.

I've had a few incidents where I've been woke up by ants crawling on me. That is very unpleasant. What if they decided to invade my bed like they did my kitchen? If the army of ants were big enough they'd have me eaten before I could wake up, like the ants do to the poor little gecko in the video below.