# Request advice for ants in topbar hive



## BerkeyDavid (Jan 29, 2004)

I wouldn't worry about it, they are full of formic acid, a good mite repellant. (not true of course for army, fire or other southern area ants).


----------



## Hambone (Mar 17, 2008)

Mine are on legs and I put about a 3" wide barrier of Vaseline on the legs 12" or so off the ground. I do the cinnamon too. Both see to work good. I have fire ant mounds all around and one about 6" away from one of the legs and no ants inside the hive.


----------



## Hambone (Mar 17, 2008)

And if the cinnamon does work. You would have to put it out quite offen. Rain, ect... I put the Vaseline on mid to early June and I will just know have to put on another coat this or next weekend. Fire ants is what I am dealing with.


----------



## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

If they aren't in the hive proper, I wouldn't worry about them.


----------



## Troy (Feb 9, 2006)

Vaseline melts when it gets hot out, but otherwise works well.

Axle grease is messy, but lasts longer.

Tanglefoot is the best thing I've found so far.

I've had problems with the other fire ant. The wood fire ant. This one gets into any crack or crevice in the hive and makes the bees very irritable. I read that it is closely related to the red imported fire ant, but they like to be in wood.


----------



## Hambone (Mar 17, 2008)

Troy said:


> Vaseline melts when it gets hot out, but otherwise works well.
> 
> Axle grease is messy, but lasts longer.
> 
> ...



Thanks for the Tanglefoot tip. I have nerver herd of it. But am going to order some today.


----------



## Tim Hall (Sep 14, 2007)

All my hives sit on big lag screws with a fender washer on each screw...really isolates where critters can crawl up and provides a ledge for vaseline to sit on. You can also use the lag screws to level the hive, if that's important to you.


----------



## Wojtek (May 31, 2005)

You may see the photo of such screw in home page
http://homepage.interaccess.com/~netpol/POLISH/Ule/Konstrukcja.htm

Description is in Polish, but this picture should be sufficient to understand it. (go down to 1/3 of this page to see this photo.)


----------



## Tim Hall (Sep 14, 2007)

Wojtek said:


> You may see the photo of such screw in home page


Yeah that's idea, but the heads point down on mine to sorta make feet. And there's a big loose washer between the head of the screw and the base of the hive.


----------



## MIKI (Aug 15, 2003)

One drop of a petrolium product leeched into the ground contaminates 1 million drops of ground water. It may last longer than you think!


----------

