Homemade Ant Traps

I just went on a two week trip to China for work, and it was amazing- but I came home to find my husband engaged in an epic battle with a fierce enemy- ANTS. He had been using store bought poison for the past two weeks with really no success.

I have memories of my mom fighting constantly with ants, so I know the madness they can cause. But they were in out kitchen (since, you know, that's where the food is), and I didn't love the idea of putting poison in our cupboards with food. Then my friend told me about making your own ant traps, and of course I was all about that!

I read different versions, but this one seemed easy and for the author it was effective, so I gave it a try! I cut her recipe in half, because I didn't need the touch and didn't want to store it. I also found it was hard to get the sugar all dissolved, but warming the water up in the kettle before pouring it in easily solved that!

1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup water (I recommend heating it)
1/2 Tablespoon Borax (which you should already have on hand if you made laundry detergent!)

In a bowl or jar, add sugar, then pour in water and stir or shake. Add borax and mix again. That's it!

Next, put it in your containers. I used cheap tupperware type containers, like leftover from grocery store hummus or salsa. I poured a little in the bottom, then punched 4 or 5 holes in the lid, and placed it on top. If you don't have dogs or kids you're worried about poisoning themselves with toxic sugar water, then you can even leave them open.

Next, place near where you find the ants coming in- a few key spots is ideal. Now you're going to go through three stages:

1. The ants will seem to ignore it and you will think they aren't working at all. You'll shrug your shoulders and walk away.

2. You'll come back a couple hours later and the traps will be covered in MORE ANTS THAN YOU'VE EVER SEEN IN YOUR LIFE. Start to panic that the sugar portion has attracted them but the borax isn't working, and you've just made the problem worse. Don't worry, this is not the case (at least it wasn't for me). You just have to give it time. Trust me, I didn't take a photo of this portion because there were so many ants I was convinced there was no way this was working, so do not panic. All is as it should be.

3. The next day the ants will slow to a trickle, and then by a day later be gone entirely.

My theory is that once they find the sugar, they're super excited, go back to the colony and tell everybody, then all the ants come party, eat themselves silly and go back to the nest, and then they all die. So far they haven't come back!