Ugh!! It seems like each spring as the flowers begin to bloom and the weather warms up again, the ants come marching (one by one) back into our house to scavenge whatever food crumbs my kids have left on the kitchen floor (or the popcorn by the tv).

We’ve tried using essential oils for deterring the little buggers, sprayed them with Thieves cleaner, which kills them quickly, and cleans up the mess at the same time… but they always seem to come back.

Last spring, we found a natural recipe that was like magic for getting rid of them.  Once we did this, we didn’t see ants for the rest of the season.

Natural Ant Bait

• 1/3 c borax 
• 2/3 c sugar

Directions:  Add water until it forms a paste. 

Saturate paper towels or cotton rounds with the juice and place at the entrances where you see them come and go from.

For those with children or small pets, it would be wise to put the mixture in a small container with holes punched in it so the ants can get in and out, but the borax is contained so they don’t get into it.

They will take the sugar liquid back to the nest and feed the other ants, and the borax kills them by damaging the exoskeleton by causing them to lose fluid and dry out.

At the time I took these first photos, there were no ants in our house except on the sugar traps.

These are from the following day.  Ants are gone.  None to be found in the house either.