Ants On My Plants: Why Ants on Plants Are Bad And What To Do About It

My neighbor Jodi told me that there were ants all over her artichoke plants and she asked if that was O.K. I said that she didn’t want ants on her plants because usually ants on plants meant aphids on plants too. She said she hadn’t noticed any aphids and I told her I would go over and check out the ants.

Here’s what I found:

Aphids everywhere—and look who’s protecting them. I showed Jody all the aphids along with the ants. Jody is an organic gardener so she asked me if it would be a good idea to get some ladybugs. I said “Nope.” This is the problem with ants. Ants will keep the ladybugs away. They protect the aphids because you see, ants will work for food, a special food that the aphids produce called “honeydew” it is sweet and sticky and ants love it.

Aphids feed by sucking the juices from plants at the same time they inject their saliva into the plant—which is toxic to the plant. The plant will eventually weaken, become stunted and may even die. The aphids also transmit diseases to their host plant. If this isn’t bad enough, the honeydew also encourages a fungus to grow called sooty mold.

What to do, what to do? Since I am an organic gardener, I don’t use bad chemicals in my garden. Most of the time a strong blast of water will get rid of aphids. If this doesn’t work then try a spray made of soapy water.

I make mine from one part Dr. Bronner’s peppermint Pure Castile Soap and nine parts water. I like Dr. Bonner's because it's simple, non-toxic and I like to read the label.

Good Golly, I think this is the third time I’ve mentioned Dr. Bronner’s in my blog. You’d think I would be getting a piece of the action, hmmm, there’s an idea.

I take this process one step further. After I get rid of the aphids, I look for the ant colony. When I locate the colony I dig it up and flood it. Then I run in the house and pray that the ants haven’t seen “The Ant Bully.”

I periodically check my veggie garden for ant colonies, figuring it can’t hurt to make it unpleasant for them, and it will perhaps cut down on my ant and aphid incidents.

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Comments

[Kalyn]

It was so fun meeting you at BlogHer, and now I'm wishing I had taken a picture of you! Sometimes I'm such a bad reporter!

I like the soapy water method too, although so far this year I haven't had problems (fingers crossed!)

[chigiy]

Kalyn,
It was great to meet you and Lydia and Anna. I wanted more time with you. I felt kind of wierd and shy. I'm normally more fun but I felt overwelmed. I stilll have not posted about the experience. I've started to about five times, maybe in the next couple of days.

[Eve]

I uee the same recipe although I do use red pepper because someone told me to add it. This works fine on regular ants.

Here is the South though, we have fire ants. and when they invade a bed, you just have to resort to fire ant killer. I hate to use it but they can take down a small cat. You just don't try to do anything organic with those.

[chigiy]

Sheesh Eve,
You have scary snakes and ants in your back yard. Do what you must do. And watch out for your cat.

[nikkipolani]

But if you can get rid of the aphids, will the ants go also? I usually dust aphids with flour until they "drown" and then hose them off.

[chigiy]

Nikki,
The problem with just getting rid of the aphids is that sometimes the ants "farm" the aphids. They actually bring the aphids back into the ant colony with them.
I like the flour idea. That's a good one.

[Stephen Albert]

The strong blast of water keeps the aphids in our neck of the vineyards away. They usually don't get a foothold since we are in the garden almost every day and catch them early. A "catch" plant (or crop) that aphids love is another way to distract them from the crops you love most. Our aphids love the oleander blossoms 25 yards away from the vegetable patch. So, I let them congregate over there and dispatch them with a water blast every few weeks. They are disturbed within hours when they come to the vegetables so they just go to the oleanders (Nerium) instead. They are much more trainable than Boo our yard dog who sometimes naps in the vegetable patch despite pleas to find a shady spot in the yard.

[D.R. Stephenson]

Those do not look like aphids to me. The photos are not very clear, but I suspect those are flea beetles - a whole different problem and nothing to do with the ants.

[chigiy]

Hi D.R.,
They maybe flea beetles, but they sure looked like aphids to me and they were covered in ants that appeared to be milking the aphids for honeydew. Hmmmmm