How does Tarp crowd handle ants?

Ants! Ants! Ants! Ants!
Everywhere I look, everywhere I camp, night & day, all summer long.
How do you tarp campers deal with the ants?
Where does one actually pitch a tarp in the piney woods where there are no ants trailing across every pitchable spot?
Seldom do I see bare dirt in the low desert that is not possessed by an ant nest or have one in close proximity.

How do you do it?

Hammock. We've got fire ants here and yup, if you aren't watching where you're pitching, you'll have painful company.
If I have to pitch on the ground, finding an ant free place is a chore. My mom use to spray "off" around our tent perimeters when we were kids, and sometimes dribbled camp gas or sufler powder around them too. It worked...ants wouldn't cross it. That was back in the 60's.....today it would be unthinkable to do that. So, give hammocks a try, especially since you're in the pines. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

When using a hammock, treat your tree huggers with permethrin to keep the ants from walking your support lines into the hammock. Things can get ugly.

Ditto on the hammock answers.

I have become a hammocker this year and I agree that is the best way to be safe from critters.

However I have backpacked in Arizona and in some places you can't find trees to hang a hammock from. So if I were tarping on the ground I would use my bug bivy

http://www.outdoorresearch.com/site/bug_bivy.html

under my tarp. I like this better than other bug netting solutions that just cover the top of your bag. Those work great against mosquitoes but not against crawling insects like ants. This one keeps me completely encased and safe from all little critters while still allowing good circulation.

Now if you are in the pines then by all means get a hammock. But otherwise consider the bug bivy.

Bug Bivey is a good answer! Forgot about those.
When I'm hiking the desert, I typically tarp it and found that using a cheap mylar space blanket as the ground cover keeps crawlies away and my bug net seals around my pad and the ground cover.
Fire ants seem to be able to get through plate steel if they want....so nothing is 100% with those.


My wife and I kayak camped last weekend and used our Hennessey hammocks....Her's was suspended from one horizontal branch! By far the most comfortable sleep in the boonies, in my opinion....and my wife's.

Ditto on the hammock. For staying away from bugs it's the best. When it's cold weather, I don't mind staying on the ground under just a tarp, but hot weather the ants (and ticks, and other creepy crawlies) have free access. I got bit a couple times by ants. Not terrible, but not pleasant either.

One thing though... if you keep your backpack on the ground during the night, make sure you brush it off before putting it on! <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />

I don't know how Arizona is with fire ants, but when I was in Texas, my priority list looked like this, in order.

1. Stay away from fire ants
2. water
3. food
4. shelter

I didn't know about tarps then, so all I used was tents or hammock. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

I bought that bug bivy too and I believe it will keep away the bugs from me. For some reason though, I don't come across ants, just mosquitos. Maybe it is too cool for ants where I hike. Not sure.

Howie

There are definitely places where the tarp thing might not work so good on account of insects. Virginia saltmarshes in summer is an example I can attest to.

Fire ant country? Mangrove swamps? Fire ants sound like fun.

Actually, since switching to mostly tarp use a few years ago, I've wimped out when doing the alpine meadow mosquito swamp thing, and switched back in those instances to either a bivvy tent or one of those jobs with the netting sewn on the front.

Was perhaps unnecessary, given that my "tarps" have doors. A question I haven't resolved through experience or inquiry.

the tarp campers don't really handle ants.

They avoid them or use some other shelter system.

You probably know this, but make sure you're sleeping area is far removed from where you eat/cook/brush teeth. And, of course, make sure to keep all sweet smelling things (deodorant, soap, etc.) away from your sleeping area too. If you notice an area with a lot of ants, try not to make camp in between them and possible food/water sources.

In 14 years and 350+ nights of tarp use in ID desert, alpine west, S. Cal desert, Sierra's, Winds, Colorado CDT, Pyreenes, French Alps, AT thru-hike, PCT thru-hike, etc. I've had 2 or 3 individual ants crawl over me. None considered biting me.
Just don't camp on top of a hill and you will be OK.

Amtrak

In the high forests in Colorado, it usually get pretty cool at night and many bugs just are not a problem like in lower, hotter places.

That's one reason I prefer a tent. Call me a wuss, but I have enough difficulty getting to sleep on the trail without worrying about creeping and crawling things getting into my bag.

Amtrak, individual body chemistry accounts for a large part of attracting insects. Look at me, for example. If there are no mosquitos in a state park, by the time I get there, they are all buzzing around me. I simply have an attractive chemistry, if there are mosquitos, they will find me. Hence I would never consider camping outside of an enclosed tent.

In Michigan, where I live, we don't have the same species of fire ants the south does, but we do have red and black ants that sting, since we had a nest of them in our backyard when growing up. So, technically, we do not have "southern fire ants" in Michigan, but we do have ants that sting and bite, but they are not common.

I have never seen those stinging ants in Michigan since.

Where did you all come up with hammock? I thought he asked about tarps. Well I must have misread something -
But if you had asked how tarpers deal with ant I would follow up the bug bivy suggestion. Its the only way to go - look at the OR bug Bivy, it is solid and will last a while, not too costly, and it works.

For ants when using a tarp use a bugnetor bivey. For ants when using a hammock use a bugnet plus I waste a little repelant on the hanging ropes and ridgeline at the trees.

I usually hammock, but often sleep on the ground on river trips when the only legal place to camp is on sand bars below the gradient boundary. Fire ants love gravel bars and they are aggressive. These are not your picnic ants, but pack animals that swarm victims and begin to bite simultaneously. Their name tells you everything you need to know about their bite: fire.

Here is the best way I have found to deal with ants in general, including fire ants: Buy them off. I leave sacrifices or tribute at the edges of my camping area - like at the four corners more or less. The ants quickly gravitate to the goodies and stay busy hauling the loot back to the nest. And they stay out of my campsite.

Their favorite appetizer is saltine crackers - nothing healthy seems to interest them. Each sacrifice (each corner) gets one saltine, crumbled into a pile. The main course is oil such as the oil from sardines or just plain cooking oil - whatever is handy. Just pour a tablespoon of oil 3-4 inches from the crackers. It will soak into the ground. That's good. The ants will not usually start on the oil unless they start first on the crackers. I don't know why. They carry the crackers off first, then start mining the oil. This is more difficult for them. They have to lick the oil from each grain of sand or bit of soil. By morning the oil field will be covered with miniature piles of mine tailings. The ants will be gone, sleeping it off, maybe.

When staying more than one night, I renew the sacrifice as needed. Once in the evening ( at all corners) is usually sufficient unless the ant population is unusually high, then I leave another one in the morning.

And treating hammock lines with permethrin is a good idea, too, in fire ant country. If they are working a tree, they will swarm a hammock tied to it. The sacrifices work for that, too.

I know that fire ant bait knocks them back pretty quick, just a couple of hours.
What is wrong with treating your camping area, especially a car camping area, with fire ant bait & killing them back for 2 or 3 days.

What fire ant bait does that?? Amdro takes days, since it is a growth inhibitor. Orthene takes hours but it is a serious poison and not a bait. I'd have no problem baiting a campsite with something that becomes inert like Amdro. It might even distract the ants from staying on DEFCON 2 all the time....but it takes a while for the ants to consider it food.
Interesting observation around here....ten years ago I would have a dozen mounds in my yard and some huge colonies back in my park. I don't have any mounds now. Wonder if they've moved on or are taking care of themselves?

Hammocks vs. Tarps....the question was "how to tarpers deal with ants". Answer..."we go to hammocks". <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

I used to do the grounds for a church and would throw down some powder I'd found(which I've forgotten, but I'll look around) & Amdro, together.
I literally could police the grounds @7am on a Sunday morning, powder & bait the rock lawn for fire ants around the play areas and by 8:30 not an ant to be found and stay clear of ants for a couple of weeks.

I found your park.

I hope fire ants are dying back.
I went to a church picnic a couple of years ago, in a field just outside of Nacogdoches, and the fire ants absolutely made it impossible to stop moving.
A person could not just stop, stand and converse without the ants attacking, and as the afternoon wore on, with 40 or so people tramping around, it just got worse & worse. The property owner was a botanist at the local university and had this peach orchard where the picnic was. He'd become convinced that the ants were developing immunity against the common ant killers.

Yup, that's my backyard. Click on the map link and you'll find my name at the bottom. I'm about to go out and mow the trails today....ick. Stevie's (Vaughn) mom gave us the money for that bridge.


I hear you about the fire ants. We don't have horny toads or quail because of the little monsters, both very plentiful at one time. The only good things about them are that they helped persuade me to try hammocks and the scorpion population has dropped. A scorpion sting feels about the same as a fire ant and I've never been covered in scorpions (many times ants! <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/mad.gif" alt="" />)....so maybe thats not a plus.
Our church broadcasts bait a few times a year which has kept them off the grounds.

I've been to many picnics and church events where fireants caused problems, especially with toddlers. It's horrible hearing little kids scream once an attack has begun, and then the aftermath a couple days later. Fire ants can put you in the hospital. They even find old folks in their beds, who can't fight 'em off.

My heart broke when he died. Only good thing my ex-brother in law ever did was introduce me to SRV's music.

Suddenly I'm remembering why I live in AK...

<shudder>

MNS

I'm from Michigan as well...I never have a problem with ants other than the occasional one of the black carpenter ants or the very tiny red ants. For me, if I get a fire going and setup my sleeping area, by the time I am ready to use it, they have all scurried off. If they don't, a little smoke in the ground area usually drives them off for the night, such as an ashed out log placed on some clear ground near my sleeping bag for a few minutes.

I can agree heartily MNS.. 20 below has it's drawbacks, but it does take care of the more obnoxious varieties of creepy crawlies....

(how I can condition myself to tolerate sky darkening mosquitos, but freak out over the thought of fire ants or worse.. tarantulas.. is beyond me but I guess I'm just a northern boy <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

<img src="/forums/images/graemlins/shocked.gif" alt="" />

Seriously? There's not a more docile critter out there. A few years ago in Big Bend (the place where you want to go, phat), there was a bumper crop of tarantulas. They were migrating in a steady march to the north....weird. One crawled right over my foot while I was having dinner. Oblivious to me but fun to watch. Basically harmless furry spiders. We have them here...very common.

I am seriously arachnophobic. I know they're docile. I know they're harmless.. but that's the rational side of me.. The stupid idiotic irrational phobic side still knows they're furry and have 8 eyes and fangs that drip sulphuric acid... so it's only my irrational side that screams like a little girl when I see one <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Phat,
Boy, do i have a video for you! I was in the Three Sisters last week and looked up from my book...and there was a bug stuck to the mesh of my tent, not 6 inches from my face, that was BIGGER THAN MY HAND! I tried to wake my daughter, but thought better of it. If she saw that monster she would have immediately packed up and left. It looked as though it could have easily bitten through the mesh and torn me apart. My dog started whimpering at the site of this giant. No kidding. I grabbed my camera, turned it on video and got about 2 minutes of it. Six legs, yellow-green body, small head and a huge stinger on it's butt! I'll burn you a copy. I still have not figured out what it was...maybe some pre-historic bug? An escaped military science project?

BF <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/ooo.gif" alt="" />

picture please of the prehistoric bug...

You found Mantis!

LOLOLOL

Ruled out the mantis.

BF <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

I sent Phat an e-mail with the video attached...POST AT WILL, Phat.

BF <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

Furry spiders? Furry spiders? Seriously, that does not make them cute and adorable. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" /> Uggh! Next you're going to tell us that Praying Mantises and Walking Sticks aren't evil little freaks of nature preparing to attack us in our sleep. You'll probably say they are really sweet and like to discuss philosophy.
Okay, I'm a little (a lot) freaked out by Praying Mantises and Walking Sticks. However, I think tarantulas would join the list were I to run into one on the trail . . .

- aint got it yet. 6 legged critters don't bother me much though - they're not a spider.
remember I said I'm *arachnophobic* - don't ask me why it matters. remember I said "irrational" <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Oh, and lobsters and crabs and the like don't count either - they're too tasty to be spiders...

Phat,
Check your e-mail, not pm's.

BF <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

Send it to someone else - he aint home (apparently).

Plus they would have to be clasified as bugs. I believe that the closest land dweling relitive to a lobster is a cockroach.

ken

yes I is..

Everyone have a look at bigfoot's bug:

http://bofh.ucs.ualberta.ca/beck/100_3224.mov


Oh, and I should have a positive ID for you soon - forwarded to one of my entymologist friends here (one of the authors of "bugs of washington and oregon").

Ah, one of THOSE bugs. Those things can silently and painlessly burrow into your skin, lay eggs, and be gone before you wake up. Thank goodness for bug nets, except that for every one you see, there are 10 you didn't see (or feel). Burrow bugs can project an image of themselves and make it seem like they are on the other side of the netting. Very crafty constructs of evolution.

Bigfoot, are you by chance suffering from stock market fear or other irrational feelings?*

*rational to you, ask someone else of you seem irrational...like your wife.

hmm. thought I posted the link but
apparantly it dissappeared or I didn't click the final post button.

Bigfoot's bug:

http://bofh.ucs.ualberta.ca/beck/100_3224.mov

I contacted an entymologist friend here (an author of "Bugs of Oregon and Washington") who says:

> Hi Bob,
>
> It's some sort of katydid-type grasshopper. I'll cc this to Dan Johnson
> in Lethbridge, in the hopes that he might recognize the species. Eerie
> movie!
>
> John

If I hear of the species I'll let you know <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

No, but i have this urge to shoot webs out my butt...what do you make of that?

BF <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

Yup...the symptoms are starting. Please keep us posted with daily observations. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

(it won't be 'webs' per se....thought you might like to know.) <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

And the reply from the second expert:

>> I'm guessing that it is one of three choices:
>>
>> the long-legged bush cricket, Anabrus longipes (which is found in
>> northern Oregon, at least, and probably also Three Sisters);
>>
>> the Blair Witch Bug (based on your video);
>>
>> or proof that aliens bred with grasshoppers in the late Devonian (the
>> only evidence being the appearance and the subject heading).
>> I feel 99% sure about choice #1, until more evidence for the other
>> choices is found.
>>
>> I am reserving the 1% unless I have the species wrong altogether.

So I'm guessing it's a bush cricket.

I'd hate to see the bush it came out of........

BF <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

It looks like they're pretty nocturnal - which is why you probably don't normally see them (other
than crawling on your tent at night <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> )

But it makes you think about what was that thing you thought was a mouse that you shoooed off
the foot of your sleeping bag when you're tarping it don't it <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />