Ants on Plants : How to control naturally

Are Ants on Plants real problem?

Climbing Ants are real problem for gardeners. Ants often keep climbing and plant look miserable and confuse that ants might be eating plants. This is not actually true.

Ants actually do not trouble your plants. But they often bring meallybugs or spread the same from other plants, which are harmful for your plants. The opposite is also true, ants come to your plants when mealy bugs are there. So, primarily, check for mealy bugs.

From our gardening community, we took advice from expert gardeners who advised real and practical ways to get rid of ants in the garden.

Here are few genuine natural and practical ways to get rid of ants :

Sprinkle some Cinnamon (dalchini) powder for Ants – says Pankaj Vasudeo Moolwani one of the admin members and passionate gardener.

According to Gardening Expert Rajesh Saxena here are few self tried and effective solution to save our plants from ants

Take 200 ml water + take 10 ml liquid handwash (any brand like Vim, Prill etc) – mix very well. Spray well to the plant and clean properly. Don’t forget to repeat alternate days, once a week – depending on how many ants are there

Another effective and natural way is – take long/lavang/cloves about 30 gm and add in 100ml water. Keep overnight. Next day morning before sunrise spray well on the effective area.

Always use any spray before sunrise or post sunset and never use during harsh sunlight

Another time tested natural way is to mix 1 pinch hing(asafoeteda) overnight with 100 ml water and 5 ml dettol or any antiseptic liquid. Shake and mix very well before applying

Dish soap even diluted with water suffocates the ants ruptures their cells, causing them to dehydrate and die. Mix well and spread the solution the areas where you see the ants entering.

“ Ants also when organic matters like bone meal fishmeal are mixed in soil. They also help indicate some pest attack is there. The eat and finished the eggs of many pests. So some extent is helpful the main problem with them is that they do harvesting of mealybug as they get honey due from them and mealybug is really difficult to remove” says Tarun Shukla who is gardening for over 30 years.

Ants never go away for one spray until they disappear spray every three days

“The presence of ants can mean there are mealy bugs. So manage that and the ants issue will also be resolved. Neem oil spray, I find, usually works best as a preventive.

A spray of green chilli-garlic and ginger, diluted with water works quite effectively.

If you use turmeric, just sprinkle some in the soil and around the pot to deter the ants Says Smitha Suri.

Also you may dig a little 2 inch of soil of the pot / soil around ground to destroy the nest so that ants can not dwell there. you should repeat once a week.

Let us not kill the ants and use the above ways – any of them and repeat after a weak or so according to the seriousness of the ant problem in your garden. Get rid of ants naturally and use any one process not all at one go, please.

About Author

	Bratati Sen www.gardeningideasandmore.com
A serious plantohlic – love to explore plants, live plant, love plant and believes gardening is fun and is a way to relieve stress and connect with nature. Always reachable for plant queries