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Hello, everybody and welcome to another episode of the faith pest control Podcast. I’m Mike Stewart, I’m your host. And today we’ve got pest expert Fred Talley, who’s going to talk about Pharaoh ants. Pharaoh ants. I don’t think they’re from Egypt may be free, it’ll tell us if they are from Egypt, but they’re called Pharaoh ants. And they’re everywhere, especially in Jasper, Georgia, in Blue Ridge, Georgia, Ellijay, Georgia, big new in all over North Georgia, Pharaoh ants are crawling, and they’re, they’re making their home here. And I’m sure they’re a nuisance. So Fred, tell us all about the Pharaoh. And all right, Mikey, Pharaoh ants are actually pretty small. The workers, the ones that you and I will see, in our day to day activities are normally about a 16th a little bit over a 16th of an inch long. So that is extremely small kind of a light yellowish to a reddish brown in color, in some of them actually can be almost like transparent. They do have a non functional Stinger, they actually use it to generate the pheromones and for those that may not really be familiar with pheromones, that’s a type of chemical substance that relieves really, that leaves a I’ll call it an odor, I don’t necessarily think it’s an odor, but we can, as humans, we can relate to that. So that the workers can communicate with each other among themselves. And primarily they use the pheromone, to because the ants are social insects, so the workers are out foraging, you know, finding food, harvesting the food and bringing it back to the colony. So they use the pheromone to identify the trail that the other workers need to follow to find the food source for that day. The Pharaoh and in I should say that is a lot of times is can be confused for fire ants. They’re smaller than fire ants. But for whatever reason they get they people get confused with them. It’s common, very common household and which has been carried just due to Commerce to virtually all inhabited regions of the world. But the primary areas that are affected are is Europe, Southeast Asia, the Americas, North America, Central America, and in Australia and the the what’s not, I think now more referred to as Australe Australe, a Australia Asia, I can’t pronounce that too well, but the islands and countries that surround Australia. They’re their major pasts, and Australia, Europe and the United States. And regrettably, they have the unique distinction of being known as one of the most, if not the most difficult household and to control. They’re notorious for being a major indoor nuisance, and especially in hospitals. These ants do not nest outdoors, typically, except in warmer climates. In colder climates, they they come established, inside of, you know, heated buildings. Pharaoh ants are considered to be a tropical species. But they do thrive in buildings almost anywhere, even even in temperate regions, they will get in buildings, given the fact that there’s central heating is there. One of the features of the pharaoh ant that contributes to its difficulty, the level of difficulty of what should control it, is the fact that have multiple queens in the colony. And on the surface that really doesn’t sound like it’s such a big deal. But what happens is that having multiple Queens when people well, I guess I should preface this by saying simply spraying in insecticide is actually a terrible idea to try to control Pharaoh ants because of this phenomenon with the malt More queens, in their colonies, when I guess when they feel threatened, or when they realize something is different in their environment, they will it’s called budding but they will split the split off into smaller different smaller colonies. And since they’re social insects, each of these little sub colonies if you will, has to have a queen. So they’ll distribute the brood which is the, the eggs, larvae pupate within the in their major colony, in in they’ll just split up into into have smaller colonies to I guess to spread out the the pressure they think that may be there. So even in the absence of a queen, if some workers get separated from the Queen, they can dislike in a honeybee colony they can raise their own queen from the brood they have available in bees as they feed them a special diet to develop into a queen I really don’t know how it operates and ants, I would assume it’s something similar nesting generally occurs in inaccessible warm and humid areas roughly 80 plus degrees and 80% Humidity they are typically near sources of food and water in such places wall voids the size of the colony can be very large, can be very small from the committee from just a few dozen members to several 100,000 members in in large and larger colonies there are can be as many as several 100 reproductive females which says that they can grow at a pretty fast pace. Being tiny that can be found in diverse places the nest are normally well hidden. Actually, it’s pretty unusual to find a nest they they’re typically inside like we said earlier, and in warmer areas they do have the ability to forage far away from the nest. Outside they didn’t they can live outside. in warmer climates like we said that they will nest and shaded areas like under debris such as leaf litter or mulch. Pharaoh ants cannot survive you’re around outside in the northern climates. I don’t even know that they could survive outside here I mean, you know we have we can have days in a row that are that are below freezing. Indoors they prefer to Nason recessed areas like wall voids in and around wall outlets under the dishwasher under refrigerators, ovens under the carpet. If the colony becomes too large, or if they are disturbed, they will sometimes move their nesting spot. They’re normally found in the kitchen and or bathrooms. But to workers can be called commonly seen trailing along the baseboards and when to sales like if you’re familiar with Argentine ants, they do the same thing. They’ll use plumbing pipes and electrical wires they’ll trail on them to get from room to room. They can and will nest in wall and cabinet voids wall voids behind the baseboard, behind winter moldings inside of curtain rods inside cardboard boxes outside in the expansion joint and in your concrete driveway. Interestingly enough they can be found in the folds of bed sheets. In fold clothes that are folded up in a drawer. They in paper bags that are folded up in newspapers that are folded up and laying around. You you might see trails for water or food sources may be available. But that’s not an indication that their nest is nearby because typically, it can be far away from that. Like I said earlier it’s fair it’s very rare to find the nest. They can do nest outdoors here in Georgia. Given they have a constant
supply of more moisture such as like around the AC unit in the summertime for sprinkler systems. The Queen’s actually can lay hundreds of eggs in our lifetime takes about dependent on environmental conditions five to seven weeks to go from egg to mature adult. They breed continuously throughout the year especially if they’re living inside heated buildings. The meeting actually occurs in the nest. And these ants do not swarm at all. Multiple I mean mature colonies will contain multiple queens, they have wing males workers, eggs, larvae and pupae. It’s a major pest major indoor passing United States regrettably, it has the ability to survive most conventional household pest control treatments. And the which allows them to establish colonies throughout a home more than just the food they may consume or spoil. They’re considered a serious pest simply because of their ability to get into things like they can nest in a sofa. You know, you’d be sitting on the sofa trying to watch TV and you have ants crawling all over you. They’re a major pest in factories, more commercial, in my experience than in residential, but bakeries, office buildings, hospitals are a big, they’re big problems in hospitals, anywhere really where food is handled. For whatever reason, and I don’t I don’t really even even know why but they’re in hospitals burn victims is in as well as newborns are subjected to an increased risk. I guess and because this ant can transmit over a dozen pathogens, like salmonella staphylococcus streptococcus. Feral ants, infest almost all areas of a building where food is available. But they will also inhabit areas that aren’t because they can get this as long as they can get to the food. They actually have a fairly wide palette and the types of food they eat. They’ll eat sweets, they’ll eat fatty foods, le oily foods, anything left uncovered for a short period of time, if they’re in that area, it’s not uncommon to find a trail of feral ants going to the food. Consequently, especially in in food service settings, there’s a lot of food that ends up being sent being thrown away just simply because it’s contaminated at that point. As always, at bats fates pest control, we offer a free consultation. If you feel like you might have a pharaoh and Pharaoh ant problem, we offer a 100% make you happy money back guarantee, if you hire fetes pest control to get rid of your bug problem. And then at the end of 30 days, you’re not 100% Happy, will come back and retreat your home for free. And we’ll keep on trading it for free until you tell us that you’re happy. That still doesn’t make you happy, we’ll give you back every penny you spent on the original treatment. Plus, we’ll pay you an additional $25 for your time and trouble just for fooling with us. The bottom line is I want you to be happy with the service we provide. Or you won’t pay a penny period. If you feel like what I’ve made have said make sense. Please call us today at fates pest control 770-823-9202 and asked to speak to me Fred tally. I’ll be more than happy to speak with you and answer any questions that you may have. Well, Fred, thank you so much for that detailed explanation of what a pharaoh ant is and does. And while we need to be aware to call you to help us solve that problem at something I don’t think a residential or business customer can do on their own. We do this podcast as a customer service for all the fine folks in Jasper, Georgia and surrounding areas in north Georgia mountain you can you can subscribe to this podcast, and all the favorite places like Apple, Google, Amazon and Spotify. But more importantly, come to the website and and review all the past episodes and share them with your friends like them. And more importantly when you have any kind of pest problems call the pest expert Fred Talley to let him help you solve your pest problems today. And until next time, this is Mike Stewart for the faith pest control podcast.
