From: jessie@IASTATE.EDU (Brent Danielson)
Subject: Re: How can I keep ants off of my hummingbird feeder?
Reply-To: jessie@IASTATE.EDU (Brent Danielson)
Organization: Iowa State University
Distribution: na
Date: Thu, 3 Sep 1992 13:06:46 GMT

In article <1992Sep3.005225.19330@pony.Ingres.COM>, boba@Ingres.COM (Bob
Andrews) writes:
> Background: I work in Alameda California, just across the Bay from San
> Francisco.  We have mostly Anna's hummingbirds here.  We also have
> sugar ants.
> 
> I put up a small Perky Pet feeder outside my new office window.  Within
> a week it was discovered and drained!  I then bought a larger,
> Rubbermaid feeder (inverted bottle drains into base that has holes on
> upper surface).  As I was replacing the feeder the hummers were
> chattering at me to hurry up.  The new feeder was an immediate hit.
> 
> A few days later, however, the hummers stopped feeding, yet I could see
> there was still plenty of fluid.  I went out to see if the base wasn't
> filling only to discover that the entire feeder was covered with sugar
> ants!
> 
> The feeder is currently hanging from a tree branch using a foot length
> of coat hanger wire with a hook at each end.  Is there some other
> arrangement (monofilament? ant-guards?) that will keep the ants off the
> feeder?  The last thing I want to do is use insecticide, as hummers are
> so susceptible to poisons.
> 
> Does anybody have any suggestions (preferably from experience) of how
> to keep the ants off of the feeder so the hummers will return?
> Thanks.
> 
> 	BobA
> --
> 
_____________________________________________________________________________
> |      o                              o    o    o        o    o    o         
|
>
|_____________________________________________________________________________|
>  Bob Andrews             Ingres, An ASK Company               
boba@ingres.com


I've had similar problems when I lived in Georgia and Arizona.  My solution was
pretty easy and effective, but sometimes messy.

Basically, what I did was to make a barrier on the hanging wire.  I tried
greasing and oiling the wire (I used a coat hanger too), but that didn't work
for more than a day.  The solution I eventually came up with was this:

Take a plastic bottle cap, such as is commonly found on a bottle of cooking oil,
and drill or melt a hole in it that is the same diameter as the hanging wire. 
Then use some silicone glue or calk (silicone window calk, silicone gasket goo,
silicone bathtub calk, etc. will work great), and glue the cap to the wire which
is threaded through the hole.  Glue above and below the cap will work best, and
a good bead below the cap will keep it from sliding down the wire.  

Having done this and when the silicone has cured for 24-48 hr, attach the feeder
to the wire so that the cap is upside down (i.e., the cap is concave up).
Hang the feeder, and then fill the cap with oil forming a moat around the wire.

Cooking oil is best.  Motor oil will probably also work, but some oil inevitably
drips or splashes onto the feeder and motor oil might be toxic if it gets into
the sugar solution.  Cooking oil is probably not so risky, and easier to clean
from time to time.  Other fluids might work too, but water evaporates too fast,
and some ants seem to like that almost as well as the sugar water.  Cooking oil
will eventually partially evaporate leaving a grease like substance and that
needs occasional cleaning.  However, in Arizona where ants are as fierce as any
place I've ever been, this works for a week or two before it needs cleaning or
new oil.  

If your ants are real big, use a bigger cap so they can'e reach across the moat
of oil.  However, try to keep the cap relatively small so that there will be
less sloshing in the breeze (a short hanging wire - say 6"- helps too).  Also, a
large cap catches leaves and twigs which make great ant bridges across the moat;
using small caps you will experience much less of this problem.

While this may seem like a hassel, it's cheap, and I guarantee that it works as
long as nothing else is touching the feeder.  

If this doesn't make much sense, e-mail me and I'll try again.  

Brent J. Danielson
Jessie@iastate.edu
Dept. Animal Ecology
Iowa State University
				

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