War! After repeated fire ant stings, two Africanized honey bee attacks and multiple poison ivy infestations, we realized that these evil forces neither allow for, nor deserve, peaceful co-existence on Dogwood Ranch.
Of the Big Three Dangers, only poison ivy is native to the area. I have seen no warnings that Texas poison ivy is about to go the way of the dinosaurs and become extent or soon find its way on an endangered species list. Imported red fire ants and Africanized bees are non-native to Texas, invasive and a threat to the native creatures of Texas (and people). Therefore, we have no remorse whatsoever about the war waged on these Big Three hazards at Dogwood Ranch.
Let’s start with the one that readers in the South may be most familiar, imported red fire ants (Solenopsis invicta Buren). Anyone who has stepped in a fire ant mound understands the pain and itch that lasts for days. The site of the bite puffs up in a red sore and usually within a day forms a white pus filled head. When the ants bite if feels like fire, thus their common name, but the bites itch for days afterwards. On occasions when I have suffered a large number bites at one time (10 or so) I have actually felt lethargic. I have no medical or scientific proof, but I believe too much fire ant venom can cause this. One of the worst fire ant experiences is when you innocently stepped in the nest yet the ants wait until they climb up your pants leg before making their presence known with a fiery bite. There are just some places you don’t want scratch a fire ant itch in public! The same holds true with chiggers by the way.
There are six known species of fire ants (Solenopsis species of the geminata group) in the United States, five of which are in Texas. Of these, four are native species and the fifth is the accidentally introduced imported red fire ant or “IFA” in government references. Another imported species, the black imported fire ant (Solenopsis richteri) does not live in Texas. Although the four native species are called “fire ants”, they are much less aggressive and less numerous than the imported species. For the sake of this discussion, the term “fire ants” refers only to the imported red fire ant (Solenopsis invicta Buren). Government and research literature refers to them as IFA (Imported Fire Ant).
How did IFA get to the U.S and when? Inadvertent importation of fire ants from the Paraguay River floodplain in South America into the United States occurred via the port of Mobile, Alabama in the late 1930's. Fire ants probably stowed away in soil used as ballast in cargo ships from South America. The aggressive fire ant spread quickly and by 1953, IFA had invaded 102 counties in 10 states.
Today, fire ants infest more than 320,000,000 acres in Alabama, Arkansas, California, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Puerto Rico. Fire ants are so damaging to agriculture and native species that on May 6, 1958 the U.S. federal government issued a formal quarantine of the ants, the “Federal Imported Fire Ant (IFA) Quarantine.” The government updates quarantine areas periodically. The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service or APHIS, an arm of the USDA, enforces the quarantine and works with fire ant infested states to regulate fire ant carrying articles, such as nursery stock and soil-moving equipment. To see the USDA map of the current quarantine area click
http://www.aphis.usda.gov/plant_health/plant_pest_info/fireants/downloads/fireant.pdf.
Texas, which is IFA infested state, has its own quarantine map, which includes Washington County where Dogwood Ranch is located. http://fireant.tamu.edu/maps/pdf/TX_RIFA_Quarantine2009.pdf. The feds take fire ant control so seriously, they have generated a 102 page Imported Fire Ant Control Manual. The manual and other information about fire ant control is posted on the USDA’s website at http://www.aphis.usda.gov/plant_health/plant_pest_info/fireants/.
Both the University of Texas and Texas A&M University have extensive fire ant research programs. The current hot research is looking for a biological non-chemical eradication method.
On Dogwood Ranch, we attempt to control fire ants with a one-two punch of chemical warfare. First, in the spring, we use broadcast bait in the “civilized area” of Dogwood Ranch. This is the area were humans work and play most of the time. We use AmdroPro Fire Ant Bait which costs us about $200.00 to cover 3 acres. We broadcast it by pulling a little spreader behind the John Deer mower. It’s just too expensive to spread over the entire property and we want to prevent run-off into the ponds, creek and waterways on and off the ranch. We are not aware of any local ranchers that treat their entire pastures. If so, they spend a fortune to do so. Second, we keep a small shaker of spot mound poison to sprinkle on the mounds that do pop-up later in the year. We use a powder and keep a can in our ranch vehicles (the all terrain vehicle or “ATV” and utility terrain vehicle or “UTV”) at all times.
I would not say we are winning the war on fire ants. We significantly reducing the massive hordes of them out of our civilized area and hope that Texas A&M and the University of Texas find and effective biological control method soon. WE would be happy to let them use Dogwood Ranch as a laboratory test site.
Dogwood Ranch’s Confucius says: “He who does not stop and poison a fire ant mound he sees along the way today, is destine to step in the mound tomorrow.”
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