OH GOD HE’S AS BIG AS A ROTTWEILER
IT’S A MONSTER
IT’S CLICKING AT ME
SEND BORAX AND SUGAR
Fine, no, he’s not some gi-hugic ant, it’s just an ant at the end of my macro lens. This one is Camponotus pennsylvanicus — the black carpenter ant. And of course he’s just here, surely excited to revel in tomorrow’s release of Invasive. And hey, did you see there’s a contest?
There’s a contest. A photo contest! Details here.
Also, speaking of ants, I highly recommend this fascinating article on the Argentine ant — an invasive species, hint hint — at Ars Technica by the awesome Annalee Newitz.
See you tomorrow for the release of Invasive…
Nab it here:
Indiebound | Amazon | B&N
Tammy says:
I love your books, but I’m sorry to say I won’t be able to read Invasive. My house has been invaded by Pharoah ants and I am seriously thinking of moving:-( Nope, can’t do ants in any form.
August 15, 2016 — 9:19 AM
terribleminds says:
EEEK. They’re a tropical bunch, aren’t they?
I think they’re one of the types best served by the Borax-and-sugar-cottonball bombs. That and diatomaceous earth, maybe?
August 15, 2016 — 9:51 AM
jademwong says:
DAMN IT CHUCK. YOU NEARLY GAVE ME A HEART ATTACK. *holds heart* I think I just aged 20 years.
August 15, 2016 — 10:38 AM
James F. Brown says:
Argentine ants are the bane of living in California. Little buggers are everywhere and will take over your entire house if they can. (I’ve read that they have multiple queens, so their population growth is not merely geometric, but expotential.) Plus, they’ve all descended from a single colony that hitched a ride to California, so they won’t fight other colonies as most ants do, because the others are “recognized” as being from their own colony.
They will invade and attempt to colonize planters, flower pots, laundry baskets of dirty clothes, filing cabinets, yada. Indoors, outdoors, it doesn’t matter. In short, anything, anywhere, anytime. BTW, the examples in this paragraph are from my own personal experience with these formic vermin. 🙁
And right now, in warm weather, is when they swarm and move out to establish new colonies. They’re probably responsible for the bulk of Raid Roach and Ant Killer sales here in the Golden State. Grrrr…
August 15, 2016 — 2:03 PM
patriciaeimer says:
Oh no. I am not an ant person. The joke is I’m known at the local farm store as the “genoicide lady” bc when we first moved into our new house we found out we had an ant colony under the porch and I went in to request the worst stuff they had. The stuff that was just this side of legal. The kid working handed me RAID and I handed it back and explained that I didn’t want RAID, I wanted something that would not only kill every ant near my house it would make them die so agonizingly that other ant colonies in the neighborhood would be so terrified that my face would become a genetic memory and ten generations later ant colonies would still be afraid to set up housekeeping in my yard. Kid told me he thought I’d need a professional exterminator for that and handed me a can of RAID to tide me over and told me he thought he might be needed on the other side of the store.
August 15, 2016 — 3:01 PM
janinmi says:
When I lived in the Florida Keys, I had fire ants in my yard and three dogs. I told a friend of my concerns about the ants vs. the dogs, and she told me how she got rid of the bastards.
She located all the ant mounds she could, then sprinkled instant grits around each of them. The fire ants greedily trucked the dry grits into their mounds. When most of the grits were gone, she then sprayed water gently down the mound entrances. Ants eat grits, drink water, go BOOM. Low environmental impact method that also satisfies the sanguine part of human brains. I tried it and it worked.
No idea if this or something similar would work on other species. Just puttin’ it out there.
August 16, 2016 — 3:28 PM
Gabe says:
Boy I sure did think that said something besides formication. /super-mature-reply
August 18, 2016 — 5:21 PM