Herbal Studies; I reek of mint, but...

We have a kind of moderately severe problem with ants in our kitichen. Someone told me they were sugar ants......whatever they are they're driving us crazy.

In Valerie Ann Worwood's book on aroma therapy, it is suggested that ants don't like mint. This morning the little terrors were on all the counters, and even the stove. Just foraging, I think, because there was not food out. Sometimes someone will leave a drop of jam or peanut butter on the counters. Such drops become a wriggling black mass of ants.

So this morning I reached in the cupboard for a little bottle of peppermint my husband bought the last time he had a cold. I took an eyedropper and put some -- probably about 1/3 of a teaspoon -- on a folded paper towel and wiped down all the counters. And the stove top. I went back in about an hour. Only one ant in sight.

He happened to be in a spot that I had missed with the mint wipe, so I tried an experiment. There were a few drops of oil left in the eye dropper. I made a ring around him (about 6 inches in diameter) and watched for a while. He scurried from one side of the ring to the other, but would not cross it.

I took some time to make a cup of tea and went back to check him out. He was still circling furiously to get out of the mint circle. In fact he looked pretty desperate. Since I have no wish to torture the Goddesses creatures, I slipped a piece of paper under him and took him outside.

Worwood's book suggests that one should plant mint around the foundations of your house, also when you have an infestation, as we do, try to find their entry point and stuff it with cotton balls soaked in mint.

Now all I have to do is get a package of cotton balls.

I wonder if a bottle of mint terpines would do the trick with those cotton balls? Talk about mint stink... whew! I wouldnt want to be in your house after a mint terpine treatment... ant or not! Still, it could work!

You can find mint terpine pretty cheap at www.poyanaturals.com I believe.

Red Emma, I would give you this caution: unless you really love mint, do not plant it anywhere other than in a closed container! It is a persistent and hardy plant that spreads quickly; once established in a garden, it is almost impossible to get rid of permanently. Having said that, there are certainly far worse things to reek of than mint!

Bob

Le_Corsair said:

Red Emma, It is a persistent and hardy plant that spreads quickly; Having said that, there are certainly far worse things to reek of than mint!

Bob

Click to expand...

Thanks, LeCorsair. I'd forgotten. I once planted three kinds in a small space in a garden we had in Tacoma. The little dummies cross-bred. We certainly had some interesting mint in those days.

Reeking mint

Thanks, Alissa,

I didn't know what mint terpines were. That looks to be a very interesting web site.

Maybe I should try that at work, I think we were built on an ant hill! The Orkin guy doesn't seem to be doing a good enough job.

I thought I would add a couple of the other benefits of using mint.

peppermint is excellant for upset stomachs, I drink peppermint tea for that.

It is great for after a meal for freshing the breath.
And I love to put a candy cane in my hot cocoa

I reek of mint

I thought I'd bring this to the fore considering a recent 'growing mint plants in the house' discussion.

Goddess Bless

Dare to ask a stupid question...

I am ecstactic to learn about the ant who would not cross the peppermint oil circle. I will be buying the oil and the cotton balls long before I get to planting anything.

(Red Emma - you are surely Karmic Queen for deeds like that, while I will burn in the ninth circle of somewhere for the Raid, hairspray and shoe attacks on legions of crawling insects. Terror inspires Terrorism, I guess.)

As for my dumb question~~ I have seen it growing in gardens and in the wild, but does it matter if it is peppermint, spearmint, - ha - wintergreen???

Obviously I am a novice gardener, among other things, and probably I am thinking of chewing gum, but living in Nipomo (all sand) on central coast of California, where it never freezes, we can't avoid piles of ants, inside and out. If mint mystifies and repels them, may it take over our small acre.

I always ponder on the ants love of a dish of dry cat food. What do they get out of it? Then one day I saw that cats refuse to touch a dish of food with ants on it.

That must be their victory: to claim the territory and steal the food of such a large and feral creature is no tiny acomplishment.

Red Emma said:

In Valerie Ann Worwood's book on aroma therapy

Click to expand...

I just realized that's a cute psudonym! "Valeri-an" and probably Worwood came from "Wormwood," which among its many uses, is the key ingredint in Absinthe.
http://www.wormwood-absente.com/wormwood.htm