How do I kill fire ants in my garden bed

[DiMart]

I just found the colony of fire ants killing the roots of my sunflowers. I’ve already lost a couple of flowers.What is the best way to get rid of them?

 

[DirtMechanic]

Probably using fungus. They are highly sensitive. Molasses and sugars that feed the soil make their carefully maintained reproduction chambers contaminated with an overabundance of fungi and bacteria and they leave. Boric acid is a killer, but you have to plate it in a mix with sugar so as to not poison the soil, but the trace amounts they bring home actually help the soil. Then there are the interesting compounds like Spinosad for example, which is a spray but also is found as a bait.

 

[Chuck]

I just found the colony of fire ants killing the roots of my sunflowers. I’ve already lost a couple of flowers.What is the best way to get rid of them?

Mix a soil drench with spinosad and pour it over the ant bed. A quart is usually enough and that equals 1/2 oz of spinosad.

 

[DiMart]

What effect will spinosad have on the sunflowers? I leave them out for the birds to eat andI would hate to poison them.

 

[Chuck]

What effect will spinosad have on the sunflowers? I leave them out for the birds to eat andI would hate to poison them.

It will have zero effect. Spinosad is a soil bacteria and it is absolutely harmless to everything except caterpillars and insects.