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SOLDIER ANT: MORE THAN JUST ANT |
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It was while in secondary school that I was taught how many factors can help the soil to be very productive.
The teacher then,mentioned soil mineral,soil air, soil water and soil living organism. Of course the soil living organism,which is my interest here, can help the soil in many ways. From making the soil well aerated to some being at the root nodules of some plants just to balance the nutrients, the role of the soil living organisms(earthworms,centipedes other insects,e.t.c) can't just be underestimated. However,my focus here is on soldier ants. Soldier ants are dark,big insects with mandibles and maxillae,very sensitive and security-conscious as well as loving to move in a crowd. Soldier ants are a regular occurrence in Nigeria during the raining season as they move from one place to another in search of food. You see them forming lines that cross the road or gathering at a corner to feed on their preys. The soldier ant is one ant that commands respect, not because of its size, but because of what it can do. When it finds its way into your body,it doesn't bite you immediately. It waits for a while when it must have gotten to a very good corner of your body to bite you hard. It kills fellow insects and invades houses in search of food. The danger is that when they visit,they come in hundreds of thousands if not millions and they are very stubborn insects to chase out. Now, soldier ants are destroyer insects as they kill and eat any other insect they come across while moving around and are also capable of carrying insects from the point of capture into their living holes. But the story here is how big a threat this insect is for people here and how dangerous the people are to the creature. One annoying part of the soldier ants is that they can come into your house and spoil a beautiful meal you've just prepared as they are very attracted to oily food/materials. So,during the raining season,people often complain of these ants invading their cupboard or kitchen and making a mess of their meal hence what some do is to consistently relocate their meal before sleeping to prevent these ants from visiting. But more hurtful is the fact that these ants also kill small animals like the domestic chickens. They don't just kill one, they go for as many as they can get. It happened to me few years ago when I was home and we normally have domestic chickens in my compound. It was at the early hours of the morning (around 3-4pm) one day that I woke up to the disturbing cries of the young chicks. I rushed out to the backyard and there they where. It was soldiers ants that launched a massive attack on some days old chicks who were still in the care of their mother hen. By the time I came out,almost all the young chickens(over six in number) had been lost as the soldier ants heavily fed on them. I could even see them transport the skeletons of those they had taken out all their flesh. I was deeply pained at the death of those chicks as the way they died left me in an unhappy mood that day. I was almost helpless and all I could do was to try and chase the ants away using detergents mixed with water. It wasn't the first occurrence neither was it the last,but none was as disastrous as that one. I took preventive measures to make the chicks more safe and it worked well. But, it didn't only happen to me at that time,it happened to some other people who didn't hesitate in killing the ants with kerosene mixed with water and other practices which are harmful to the environment like killing the ants by burning rubber materials in the pool of the ants or burning papers to kill and chase them away. I have found out that few drops of insecticide can chase them very far away and that's what I suggest to anyone that faces the challenge instead of burning and polluting the environment with smoke in the name of killing soldier ants. The ants came visiting again in my street but this time,in a fairly peaceful mood as it visited waste sites and dust bin but also killed some living organisms in the soil which I some them transporting as well as cockroaches. I would have been disastrous if these ants are active throughout the year as the soil may have no have no living organism to aid it's aeration and germination of crops. Again,my concern is that the way this insects are killed in their numbers,I hope nature will have a way of keeping them in existence even though they are destructive, they give you joy with the intelligence they exude when you study or observe them closely. But then,can it just stop reducing the number of soil living organisms?
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10 Comments
Thank you for sharing, Udeh!
Posted 30-11-2014 13:29
As Rohan,Arushi and Rahulhave said apply organic and non-toxic insecticide,so that you can keep them away from your meals and house but let them play their role in soil's fertility Udeh.And thanks for your article.
Posted 30-09-2014 13:12
@Konstantinos it can be so sad,but I am confident that nature will find a way to balance it up with our help.
Posted 30-09-2014 03:16
Thanks @Arushi and @Rahul for your priceless suggestions at least,peppermint and catnip are common in your suggestions and I can't say enough how important I consider them.
Thanks so much.
Posted 30-09-2014 03:13
@Rohan, nature will always find a way to balance this one but we have to help facilitate it.
I will always preach that the ants shouldn't be killed. Thanks for your very important comments.
@She, ants actually do kill chicks. Soldier ants in this case.
Posted 30-09-2014 03:08
Interesting to know that the ants can actually kill chicks. Rahul and Arushi, mind to share the links for the articles?
Posted 29-09-2014 20:33
Thank you Udeh for the inresting article.
here in our home we usually clean them with simply water. some chalk like material is found in our area. we draw some lines in our kitchen using that material which helps us to keep away from both ant cockroach and other insects which invade our food.
after reading the article, i read few articles about eco friendly way to control ants. This is what i found really amazing(considering we have always one of the following items at home ):
sprinkle these in ant trails aspartame, black pepper, borax, catnip, cayenne pepper, chili powder, cinnamon, crushed mint, cucumber, a mixture of baking soda and powdered sugar, or citrus peel and water, or white vinegar and water. If the ants return, we think the idea that we'll try is to spray peppermint or spearmint essential oil on the trail.
Posted 29-09-2014 13:15
Thanks for the interesting article! It is really sad sometimes to see how natural creatures interact with each other... I am sure that nature will find a way to balance soldier ants with the other living organisms, as it always does.
Posted 29-09-2014 03:26
Thanks , Udeh , for an interesting introduction of soldier ants , especially the way they treat /bite our body.
Due to the fact that these ants can easily enter our houses , spoil the food , it is important to put some preventive measures in place like keeping the food and water sources closed , blocking points of entry into the home etc.
Another point is that we should use organically approved, non-toxic bait insecticide(rather than using chemical based insecticide /spray). I have also read that we can grow repellent plants around our house to keep ants away (soldier ants hate Catnip, Pennyroyal, Peppermint, Sage etc)
Posted 29-09-2014 03:11
Udeh, Soldier ants are indeed a menace. I see this as part of nature's cycle. What we can do is that take enviro-friendly measures to keep them away. Do not kill them at random. This will create imbalance in the eco-system.
Thanks for a thought provoking report.
Posted 28-09-2014 18:37