We’ve had our share of squatters this last year, but have dealt with them pretty effectively for the most part. Some have been embraced, like the families of bunnies that live in or near our yard, or the spiders that reside in the house but take care of all sorts of creepy crawlies and keep the cat entertained. Others, like the mice that invaded our space, the wasps that stung my lil boy five times, or the red lily beetles have been swiftly eventually executed. I thought that we had taken care of our spring ants as well, but I was so very, very wrong.

Last Sunday, upon return from vacation, we were lounging around the house getting ready to head outside for a barbecue. It was a really hot day, and the sun was streaming in through the west-facing windows. I was talking on the phone as Willy herded Goose and Woo for shoes. I heard them go in the room, and then there was silence. Willy called me to come into the room in that right now and I am trying not to panic voice. I dashed into the room and saw that both the lils and Willy were fine. What they were staring at, transfixed on in fact, was not. The ants that were crawling streaming out of one of the window frames. They were big and black and there were hundreds of them.

The word vacuum came out of my mouth, and Willy ran down to get it while I continued to watch in horror. He was back in record time, and we started to suck them up. There were hundreds upon hundreds of these big ants, and they were now coming out of the frames of two different windows, carrying what appeared to be all of their worldly belongings. We clearly had a problem.

About twenty minutes later, we noted that the exodus was now a mere trickle, so we sealed the room after setting out traps and poison , moved the vacuum outside while it was still running, and sealed the vacuum bag and all the ants in a plastic garbage bag. We sat down to eat, but kept checking to make sure that there was no second wave. They seemed to be under control.

I don’t know what happened that made them freak out so, but there was clearly something wrong in their world. It may have been that the heat became too intense and they decided to move to a cooler location, or that some other pest attacked their humble home. I suppose we’ll never know, but can acknowledge that this is a large problem.

Willy was home with Woo the next day, and did some googling to see what next. All of the sources that he found pointed to use of the same poison that we had used to keep them under control . This comforted me, but I kept playing worst case scenario in my head, and did some googling of my own. Turns out that one of the pretty defining characteristics of a carpenter ant is…

A hairy ass. Crap. We need an exterminator. Until we get this figured out, no bug of any sort is safe in this house.