Fire-Ant Campaign Turns Up the Heat

With sightings of fire ants on the rise around the Southland, state agriculture officials are preparing a massive public-information campaign to help combat the insect with the mean sting.

Today in Rancho Santa Margarita, ground zero for California’s fire-ant infestation, the state will announce a plan to use everything from billboards to television spots to spread the word on how to identify and help eradicate the pest.

The campaign, expected to cost about $1.2 million, will include mailings, billboards, bus advertisements, and television and radio spots. The ads will be somber--simply photos of sinister-looking ants with warnings in English and Spanish to leave the ants alone and call fire-ant experts.

The television advertisements will feature celebrities, including Mexican American singer and composer Lalo Guerrero.

“We don’t want to live with these ants; we want to get rid of them,” California Department of Food and Agriculture spokesman Larry Cooper said Tuesday. “We can get rid of them--if we do it right, if we educate people.”

Those meeting today in Altisima Park in Rancho Santa Margarita to announce the new campaign include: State Agriculture Secretary William J. Lyons Jr., county Agriculture Commissioner Rick LeFeuvre, state Assemblyman Lou Correa (D-Anaheim) and state Assemblyman Dick Ackerman (R-Fullerton).

“It is only with (residents’) vigilance and reporting that we can rid California of this . . . pest,” Lyons said in a statement.

Orange County has about 1,300 identified fire-ant sites. A site can contain several colonies. Los Angeles County has about 200 discovered sites. Other counties have fewer than 80. Fire ants were first found in the state in late 1998.

“We just have more fire-ant sites than the rest of the state combined,” said Mike Hearst, spokesman for the Orange County Fire Ant Authority, one of the agencies the public-relations campaign is designed to help.

The campaign, funded by the California Department of Food and Agriculture, is a sign that the state is taking the fire-ant problem seriously, and “it bodes well,” Hearst said. The campaign comes about six months after the creation of the county’s Fire Ant Authority with $5.9 million from the agriculture department. Until now, the Fire Ant Authority had to fend for itself, publicizing by word-of-mouth, through newspaper articles and from people contacting the authority.

The authority exterminates ants outdoors at no charge by using chemicals a layperson can’t buy over the counter. The authority uses two compounds to kill ants. One sterilizes the queen ant; the other prevents the ants from processing the nutrients from food and starves them. The authority treats yards and neighborhoods, but not inside homes.

Fire ants resemble other ants, but their sting can be fatal for a small percentage of people who are allergic. Because they look like other ants, the authority asks that people do a “pest test.” Hearst said people should sprinkle potato chips around backyards (the ants like the grease) and catch a few ants in resealable bags. Residents can use a cotton swab soaked with dish soap to pick up the ants. The soap kills and preserves the ants.

Place the cotton swab in a resealable bag and freeze it for 15 minutes to make sure the ants are dead, or simply freeze the entire ant-covered potato chip. The authority said residents should mail the bags; if officials find the test samples are indeed fire ants, they will arrange for that yard to be treated.

“We really do want people to send us bags of ants,” Hearst said. “Put them in that resealable bag and we’ll check ‘em out. We really have a singular purpose. Find fire ants. Treat for them.”

As it stands, the authority gets about 100 bags a week, sometimes more; when the program first began earlier this year, the authority got only a fraction of that.

But the authority wants more than the 100 bags a week.

“The [public relations] campaign should help get the word out,” Hearst added. “We don’t want to end up like Houston or San Antonio or Dallas.”

According to various studies, including one at the University of Texas at Austin, those cities spend millions of dollars but have succeeded only in keeping the fire ants at bay.

Hearst said Orange County is infested largely because the area is ever-developing: New housing subdivisions and new plants brought into the area throw the natural order out of whack.

“It started with some nurseries, we know that,” he said. “The nurseries are clean now. But the ants are here, and when you live in an area where you are moving soil and dirt around so much, the ants get moved around too. The ant problem is a byproduct of our growth. . . . It’s going to get worse if we don’t learn as much about them as we can right now.”

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To report fire ants, call (888) 4FIREANT or visit the Fire Ant Authority Web site: https://www.ocfireant.com.

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Fight Back

The Orange County Fire Ant Authority is asking residents to help fight the insects. What to do if you suspect fire ants are in your yard.

1. Spread potato chips out in a 25-foot intervals in backyard.

2. Kill ant by touching it with cotton swab dipped in dishwashing liquid.

3. Place dead ant in plastic bag.

Mail to:

O.C. Fire Ant Authority

P.O. Box 59

Santa Ana, CA 92702

(888) 4-FIREANT

4. If fire ants are found, a field inspector comes to your home and spreads bait designed to make the queen infertile.

Source: Orange County Fire Ant Authority