# Controlling ants around goats



## churchx3 (Apr 1, 2010)

Any suggestions on what can be used safely to control ants around goats?  I live in the South and ants can be a problem especially in the spring/summer.  I hate the thought of my babies unsuspectingly walking into an ant hill.


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## doublebow (Apr 1, 2010)

Get a bait type product with "spinosad" as the active ingerdient. It is the only thing I have used that worked for fire ants. It works for all ants though. I used a product called "come and get it" last summer and it was awesome. The nice thing is that is also approved for organic operations. It is some kind of bacteria that affects only ants so even if a chicken eats it or it gets on the goats it won't hurt them.


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## warthog (Apr 1, 2010)

Chickens.   

 I used to keep my chicks in with the goats and didn't have too much of an ant problem.


I now have 40 chicks, and it was not practical to keep them in with the goats, not enough room, too much mess.

Every now and again, when the goats are out browsing I will put a few of the chicks in the goat pen, in fact I have four in their right now, I can't say it gets rid of them all, but it certainly helps and gets rid of any other bugs as well.

Just my way.


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## Ariel301 (Apr 1, 2010)

Mix two cups of sugar and two cups of water in a saucepan and bring it to a boil on low heat. Stir it constantly for about five minutes until it becomes a thick syrup, then remove it from the heat and mix in a couple of tablespoons of borax laundry soap. Then pour it into whatever sort of small disposable dish you can find (I like to use the lids off of old juice or milk bottles) and sit them near the ant hills. The ants will eat the delicious candy, and it will kill them. They will take it to their queen and feed it to her, and she will die too. The borax kills them, but it is not toxic to animals or children if they get into it. Although if you want to put it in the enclosure where the goats are, you may have to find a creative container so your goats don't try to eat the container too!


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