Critters
i love animals. you know that is a true statement if you know me well. those of you who have been reading my blog and don't know me can probably make the same conclusion.
i have been wanting to get a betta for my desk at work since i started my latest job back in 2004. i thought it would help to have the little guy there for me to watch when i needed a diversion. so i finally gave into my need and bought one at petco this past weekend. now that was hard for me to do since i normally wouldn't promote buying animals at a pet store, especially petco. but i couldn't resist. i saw a bunch of crowntail betta varieties i never saw before.
here's a picture i borrowed from another site of the beautiful fins.
the one i bought is a combination of blue and red. i named him "spike" after my favorite character from buffy the vampire slayer. i thought it was an appropriate name given the personality of the male betta and the appearance of his tail.
once i got home i went into typical obsessive mode. was the mini aquarium i bought the right home for spike? what is the best food for him? on and on my obsessive mind went. then my obsessive fingers took over. i hit the internet and read a bunch of conflicting information.
long story short, i decided to use the mini aquarium i bought since my desk can't fit anything larger. i also bought better food than what came with the 'kit'; spike ate it immediately.
so the title of my post reads "critters". that's plural right?
so you're probably wondering what else i bought. the other animals that we have were free.
f'n ants!!!
it's been raining so much lately that ants have been infesting our kitchen. we've tried ant traps, caulking cracks where we think they are coming in from the outside, and mass squishing. but we can't seem to stop them.
one night i came home to find a trail so thick and wide on the floor that i thought it was a bunch of dried up dirt. there were actually thousands running down the wall from the cabinets, on the floor and then inside the garbage can. it was soooo groooooossssss.
we have bate traps everywhere. i honestly don't think they are working. i think we're just attracting more!
when i was a kid i had always wanted the ant farms that were advertised in comic books. you know what they say, 'be careful of what you wish for!'
p.e. (post entry) a very weird thing happened. i posted this entry and got a comment from cheryl only to find this morning that some gremlin unpublished my entry and reverted my edits to an earlier version. weird.
i have been wanting to get a betta for my desk at work since i started my latest job back in 2004. i thought it would help to have the little guy there for me to watch when i needed a diversion. so i finally gave into my need and bought one at petco this past weekend. now that was hard for me to do since i normally wouldn't promote buying animals at a pet store, especially petco. but i couldn't resist. i saw a bunch of crowntail betta varieties i never saw before.
here's a picture i borrowed from another site of the beautiful fins.
the one i bought is a combination of blue and red. i named him "spike" after my favorite character from buffy the vampire slayer. i thought it was an appropriate name given the personality of the male betta and the appearance of his tail.
once i got home i went into typical obsessive mode. was the mini aquarium i bought the right home for spike? what is the best food for him? on and on my obsessive mind went. then my obsessive fingers took over. i hit the internet and read a bunch of conflicting information.
long story short, i decided to use the mini aquarium i bought since my desk can't fit anything larger. i also bought better food than what came with the 'kit'; spike ate it immediately.
so the title of my post reads "critters". that's plural right?
so you're probably wondering what else i bought. the other animals that we have were free.
f'n ants!!!
it's been raining so much lately that ants have been infesting our kitchen. we've tried ant traps, caulking cracks where we think they are coming in from the outside, and mass squishing. but we can't seem to stop them.
one night i came home to find a trail so thick and wide on the floor that i thought it was a bunch of dried up dirt. there were actually thousands running down the wall from the cabinets, on the floor and then inside the garbage can. it was soooo groooooossssss.
we have bate traps everywhere. i honestly don't think they are working. i think we're just attracting more!
when i was a kid i had always wanted the ant farms that were advertised in comic books. you know what they say, 'be careful of what you wish for!'
p.e. (post entry) a very weird thing happened. i posted this entry and got a comment from cheryl only to find this morning that some gremlin unpublished my entry and reverted my edits to an earlier version. weird.
posted by Keith at 7:20 PM
2 Comments:
okay, as for the f'n ants... this works for me sometimes; if you can find the source where they are coming in from you can sprinkle a good dose of nutmeg & most ants will not cross it. HATE the ants.
congrats on spike!
They say ants won't cross over a chalk line so if you can find where they are coming in from, draw a chalk line around them. For us, we seem to get invaded a few times a year and we resort to the Grants traps (which take about a day to actually work because they have to bring the stuff back to the queen to kill her off) and sprays. We try to avoid the sprays though but sometimes it is the only thing that works so we just make sure the windows are open and we're going to be out for a few hours.
The other thing you can do, if possible, is to try to find the nest if it is outdoors and then dig until you've found the queen (she'll be the biggest ant) and then pour boiling water into the nest to kill off the queen and the minions and that will be one less nest to deal with.
If you can catch the scout early on before it tells the others where a food source is, that helps a lot too. So, a stray ant is probably exploring and laying the groundwork for other ants to follow. Kill that one and they won't come in via that route.
Too bad Spike doesn't eat ants. :)
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