Ants on Pepper Plants

R

Ronin

Hi, I have finally got my pepper plants in my greenhouse and now there are ants crawling over them. I believe they are carpenter ants since there is a lot of old wood near my greenhouse. Are they friends or foes?
 
My ground cherry has been slightly infested with them. From what I gather, they're good in that they help with pollination, but they also make it hard for real pollinators to do their job and they protect pests like aphids. I tried the whole water bottle with holes full of water, honey, and borax and it was completely full within two days. I'm talking it looked black. (I'm sure there was dirt too but you could make out tons of little ants in it)
 
Oh no! Yeah ants can be tough on the plants. I've been trying to redirect them to the plants I find infected by putting them in the trashcan. Them and Aphids seem to go together...if you see one there's always the other at least on pepper plants.
 
If they're carpenter ants, I don't believe they're harvesting aphids.  In fact, carpenter ants tend to feed on termites.
 
solid7 said:
If they're carpenter ants, I don't believe they're harvesting aphids.  In fact, carpenter ants tend to feed on termites.
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Thx for this, I always just thought all ants were aphid harvesting enemies.
Im a little to urban to have carpenter ants I think, but now Im going to read up a bit more on the little buggers I do get.
Ive got a bunch on a couple of my plants right now so Im just starting to combat the enevitable aphid assault(the smll black ants I have always come with aphids).
 
Double check what people call Carpenter ants. Google says some Carpenter ants do harvest aphids. But they're not like any variety that I've ever seen.

Fun fact - Carpenter ants are actually quite delicious.
 
I did a check for aphids and didn't find any, but I'll be looking again.
Also if the ants are eating the aphids why would I kill the ants? Aren't they helping?
 
Honestly, I haven't seen any aphids on my plants that were (still are) covered in ants, but I'm sure they wouldn't make getting rid of the aphids any easier. I've only tolerated them because I haven't seen any aphids and they don't *seem* to get going after the fruit. While I haven't had a flower drop on that plant yet, I'd trade that in within seconds if they started keeping up aphids.
 
solid7 said:
Double check what people call Carpenter ants. Google says some Carpenter ants do harvest aphids. But they're not like any variety that I've ever seen.

Fun fact - Carpenter ants are actually quite delicious.
Click to expand...
Eh, Ill take the experience here over google.(words to live by)
Google is ranking based on advertising so if the real info is not profitable/mrketble somehow, its buried 30 pages into a search.
As for the fun fact... I tried but they just fall through the grill.
If it dont fit on my grill, it aint going in my mouth... lol
 
I've always had an ant problem at this house and always had an aphid problem (go figure). I did boric acid with honey, and it worked but still didn't put a large enough dent in them. I finally had an exterminator come out to spray and no more ants. And coincidentally, no aphid problems this year. I learned a valuable lesson this year. Not saying that ants are the sole cause for aphids but taking care of them will at least give your beneficial aphid eating insects a chance to keep their numbers down.
 
I had a look for ants again today and there was a lot less there. On my 10 plants, I could only see about 5. How many ants would there be if they were farming aphids?
 
MulchyDreams said:
Oh no! Yeah ants can be tough on the plants. I've been trying to redirect them to the plants I find infected by putting them in the trashcan. Them and Aphids seem to go together...if you see one there's always the other at least on pepper plants.
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The ants farm the aphids.  Kill them with diatomaceous earth.
 
I've used black pepper sprinkled around the base of my potted peppers.  You could actually see the ants racing to leave the pot.  It's worked for me, maybe give it a try.
 
While this did keep them out of my pots, I had to also use Terro liquid ant bait as well to "control the population".
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jedisushi06 said:
The ants farm the aphids.  Kill them with diatomaceous earth.
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But that's only effective until your first watering.

I have a 50lb bag of the stuff, that I had to repurpose, on account of how shockingly ineffective it became once wet.  (although it was great right up to that point)
 
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