From sals@rain.orgTue Feb 21 22:42:33 1995
Date: Tue, 21 Feb 1995 18:42:10 -0800 (PST)
From: Sal Schettino <sals@rain.org>
To: "Lawrence F. London, Jr." <london@calypso-2.oit.unc.edu>
Cc: sust_ag-mg@ces.ncsu.edu
Subject: Re: Anyone know anyone 

On Tue, 21 Feb 1995, Lawrence F. London, Jr. wrote:

> On Tue, 21 Feb 1995, Sal Schettino wrote:
> 
> > Living on an ant hill I have seen that if I can stop the ants I can maybe 
> > stop a lot of the insect damage.  I usually wrap a little tape around the 
> > trunk of the trees where the ants are lined up.  On the tape I put 
> > tanglefoot to form a barrier.  Then I may spread some Diatomaceous Earth 
> > in the tree to make the ants already in the tree jump off. I lose some of 
> 
> How often do you need to reapply the DE since rain and wind will wash it 
> away; or does it lodge in the cracks in the tree bark? 


I just put the DE on once to get the ants that are in the tree before I 
put the tangle foot to drop off.  If I don't they seem to stay in the 
tree. 


> > > the battles and  I heard that 
> > there maybe someone working on a confusion technique where one could put 
> > a pheromone around the tree and that line of ants will forget the 
> > mealybugs in the tree and go somewhere else.  Anyone know about this one!
> > I would love to confuse those darn ants they seem single minded about 
> > hearding those darn mealybugs.  Is there such a Pheromone and what other 
> > pheromones are there out there that may help reduce chemicals.  
> 
> Why keep the ants away from the mealybugs? Don't they eat them?
> What plants do ants harm?

the ants don't eat the mealybugs they heard them and take car of them.  
they move them from tree to tree and fight off benificals that try and 
eat the mealybugs. The mealybugs get my cherimoyas and lemons also.  
I was hopeing someone was working on a Phermone that you can put in the 
ant trail to make them brake the line and go somewhere else.  




> > ________________________________________________
> Lawrence F. London, Jr. - london@sunSITE.unc.edu 
> ------------------------------------------------
> 
> 

Sal Schettino,Organic Farmer,don't panic eat organic,sals@rain.org
or check out my homepage:            http://www.rain.org/~sals/my.html

From Cyronwode@aol.comWed Feb 22 20:38:15 1995
Date: Wed, 22 Feb 1995 12:37:50 -0500
From: Cyronwode@aol.com
To: sust_ag-mg@ces.ncsu.edu
Subject: ants for larry london

Larry London asked:

>Why keep the ants away from the mealybugs? Don't they eat them?
>What plants do ants harm?

Ants "farm" various insects, most notably aphids and scale insects on trees
and shrubs. They do this to get their "honeydew," partially metabolized
sugar-water the insects excrete for the ants to drink. Why do they do this
for the ants? Because the ants carry the little wingless critters around and
clean up after them and keep them on fresh pasture, like cows. In fact, the
whole thing is called "herding" and when the ants press the aphids to get
them to excrete the sugar-water that is called "milking. It's a big old
metaphor -- and the trees and shrubs get drunk dry by the thousands of tended
aphids that the ants carry onto them. 

Hope this explains why folks put sticky tnglefoot on trees to keep the ants
away. 

