Pesky guest plagues O'ahu

By Walter Wright
Advertiser Staff Writer

It had been only three months since Don McDiarmid Jr. of Kailua had his house tented for termites, with the welcome side effect that those pesky ants were gone, too.

The white-footed ant is one of more than 40 species of ants found in Hawai'i. While its body is black, its feet are white. Walter Nagamine • Dept. of Agriculture

"Then all of a sudden, here comes the little Lone Ranger again, waltzing across my newspaper, and I said to my wife, 'They're back.'"

State entomologists believe McDiarmid and hundreds of his neighbors are being invaded by Oahu's pest du jour, the white-footed ant.

"I didn't see if his feet were white or not — hey, I'm 80 years old and my eyes aren't as good as they used to be," McDiarmid said.

But he did see a column of them pouring out of the back of a wedding picture, where they had apparently made a nest.

"I'm not going to lie there and let them do this to me," McDiarmid said. "I want to defend myself."

Bernarr R. Kumashiro gets about five calls a month from people like McDiarmid at his office at the State Department of Agriculture's plant pest control branch.

Kumashiro, a taxonomist who identifies and classifies such critters, says people want to know what ant they're dealing with.

The white-footed ant, one of more than 40 species of ants found in Hawai'i, has been around here for about 100 years. But it is only in the past five years that Technomyrmex albipes, as it is known in scientific circles, has become a household nuisance as it has found its way indoors, Kumashiro said.

'Aiea resident David Shak was less worried about the crawling ants than black ants with wings "flying all over the inside of my house." Shak said the flying ants were able to make their way through his window screens and into the house.

Kumashiro said some ants, like termites,develop wings in their reproductive phase. Those in Shak's house could be the white-footed kind, he said. The winged females can become queens, but the winged males die after their mating flight.

Residents also usually want an, ahem, antidote.

Kumashiro recommends the old standby: a combination of sugar water and boric acid powder. The sugar and water attract them and the boric acid, a stomach poison, can kill them and any ants in the colony which they feed, such as the queen and the larvae.

Michael Botha, a third-generation pest control operator who runs Sandwich Isle Termite and Pest Control, says the sugar water bait usually isn't enough.

"Ants are very picky feeders," Botha said. "One day, the queen might want fats, another day protein, and another day carbohydrate, and if you use one bait they may not get a lethal dose.

"It's been our experience people try to control them, and then when the ants get really entrenched they give up and get a professional to come in and take care of it with comprehensive programs," Botha said.

Homeowners with help may be able to keep ants out of their residences, Botha said, but the problem is not going away.

"This place, Hawai'i, is overwhelmed with ants, and that's not changing," he said. "What may be changing is our threshhold, what we notice, and what we accept."

Reach Walter Wright at wwright@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8054