Beating the Ants

Wow! The first harvest of strawberries is in for moi. An almost full colander! Excitement is in the air, since I am winning against the ants.



Last year I added more strawberry plants. Runners that rooted I dug up and planted elsewhere. Care continued throughout the season.

But who enjoyed the strawberries? The stinkin' ants. I'd watch a particularly lovely strawberry ripen, only to pick it and discover the bottom side had been eaten away by tunneling ants. Arrgghhh.

This year. Two plans. First, which I have not used yet, was the super strong ant hotels with two kinds of food to double attack. Second, a fence. So the ants would stay out.

Just kidding about the fence. Only the part about the ants staying out. My honey built me a fence and I gently tied up the stalks bearing strawberries. Excellent! Still need to work on the fine tuning of not tying them up too tight (they are very heavy, my producing plants). A few had their circulation cut off and they wrinkled up. But overall results are positive.



Score so far: Moi, all the strawberries.

Ants? Zero. They haven't realized it's strawberry season. Yet.