# Another potential Alfred Hitchcock night



## seminole wind (Aug 22, 2015)

a few years ago, I was sitting watching tv in the living room and noticed ants. Not just ants, but a thick freeway of ants that went all around the wall of the living room, dining room, and almost the kitchen. Maybe 40 feet. I was horrified. It was around 8pm. There was nothing I could do but vacuum them up. When I got to the end of the trail, the trail was filled again. After the 3rd time, I went outside and sprayed Home Defense along the trail they came in. (I had a seizure dog and was reluctant to use spray in the house). Finally it stopped. I must have been up til 3 in the morning dealing with it til I finally called it quits and went to bed.

Last night, 2am, I'm watching tv in my bed and have an ant on me. Then another. I look behind the bed and there's a trail of ants. I got out the Home Defense and sprayed along the walls and outside on the patio where they were potentially coming in. Both times reminded me of horror movies.


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## robin416 (Sep 8, 2013)

Dang it, I hate when that happens. I got something this year to do the perimeter of the house that is supposed to last three months. It's supposed to be safe but who knows. I know it seems to be working.


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## seminole wind (Aug 22, 2015)

I use home defense by ortho. It says 12 months, which is true. But ants always find some little unsprayed spot. They are no more!


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## robin416 (Sep 8, 2013)

Sem, one. Ants, zero.

I did use home defense in TN but for some reason it just didn't seem to be very effective here. That's why I went in search of something that would work and not poison everything within five miles.


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## seminole wind (Aug 22, 2015)

I've used Home Defense for 10 years now. Most times if I find a bug it's dead. Indoors, I find it lasts 12 months. But I haven't sprayed everywhere because for the last 10 years we had a dog with epilepsy, and did not want to use anything that would set his seizures off. So we spent 8 years without chemicals in the house UNTIL our old dog who sleeps right next to my husband under his desk turned out to be so infested with fleas that she got so anemic that she could barely keep her balance. And, under hubby's desk was so much flea crap I can't tell you. Right under his desk in plain site. The dog was an American Eskimo and had a coat so thick you could not get your fingers to her skin thru the hair. I clipped her down and washed her like 5 times. Then she got frontline. She also got iron supplement until she was acting better. I can't believe this all happened right under hubby's nose. Well that was the end of not using chemicals.


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## WeeLittleChicken (Aug 31, 2012)

Talking about ants and horror stories... 

When I was about seven or eight years old I started hearing this noise in my walls at night. It sounded like chewing. I called for my mother but by the time we were back in the room the noise had stopped, it was blamed on nightmares and blah blah blah. I tried numerous times to bring attention to it but the same events would follow. This went on for months with the noise getting louder and louder until it was on all sides and every inch of wall. CRUNCH! CRUNCH! CRUNCH! I'd long since stopped trying to convince anyone of anything... though it did haunt me and keep me up. What was in my walls?!

And then some time before we moved out I noticed a trail of carpenter ants making their way up the bulkhead under my bedroom window. I can't imagine there was much wall left by then... but I FINALLY convinced my mother something really was up! UGH! I will never forget that noise!


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## dawg53 (Aug 25, 2015)

Hope they arnt carpenter ants Karen, like WeeLittleChicken mentioned. I had a minor run in with them at my other house in Georgia.


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## seminole wind (Aug 22, 2015)

Wow the crunching, glad it wasn't a rodent. 

Jim, when we moved from one house to another in NY, we had to take the patio doors down to get the furniture out. The inside frame was loaded with huge carpenter ants. I sprayed them all with raid , vacuumed them up, and put the patio doors back in. Gross.


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## MikeA_15 (Feb 21, 2016)

Luckily we don't have the horror movie ants here in Northern Cal. I don't like finding a scorpion in the house though, or a yellow jacket nest when I'm cutting pasture grass, or in a wood pile.


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## dawg53 (Aug 25, 2015)

Mike, we have tiny scorpions here. You probably have much bigger and venomous ones where you live. I found one in my mailbox one day, scared the heck out of me. Then another by the spigot on the back side of the house. I didnt know we even had them here. I've gotten nailed by yellow jackets before, feels like getting hammered hard with a glowing red hot needle. Very painful. That's the only way I can describe it.
What really scared me once was when I pulled a hubcap off the wheel of my car to fix a flat tire, and there was a big black widow spider inside the hubcap. I about had an accident in my pants!! 
I dont do spiders very well at all.


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## nannypattyrn (Aug 23, 2015)

We have blk widows, brown recluse (fiddleback), scorpions and several different kinds of wasps. I see yellow jackets around, but the big red wasps are more out in the open with their nests. We keep our house sprayed for spiders esp the fiddleback. I used to see in our bathtubs frequently. We we first moved on our place we got scorpions in the frequently as we because we stirred some of their territory up when we moved our first house in.


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## nannypattyrn (Aug 23, 2015)

Jim keeos wasp spray pretty much in reach every where. BTW, I have many hilarious stories about him and the many snakes we also have around here.


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## seminole wind (Aug 22, 2015)

We have Brown Recluses but I've only seen one on the patio. We have black widows on the north side of our house under the sills, but I leave them alone. I've only seen black snakes a few times. Wasps especially paper wasps don't bother me. I've only got warning stings when I was too close to their nest. Other than that, they watch me but leave me alone. Those are the ones that "look" like yellow jackets but their legs hang when they fly. Yellow jackets are the ones I don't like. I do get rid of any nests I have. In NY we had a yellow jacket infestation in our kitchen wall. It was horrible. They were all over the house. We had to get an exterminator.


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