The ants have come back after a number of weeks. I think if an insect could be intelligent, it would be these ants. They've built their nests very high up in my golden chain tree where I can't get to them with a fiery torch. They behaved themselves for a long time staying on the fence line and not encroaching into our living space... until recently. Bite! Ouch! Bite! Ouch!

They have the ability to crawl up my legs undetected and crawl into the short pants I'm wearing. I have learned to do a respectable Irish jig since then.

 

So, I figured I will somehow interrupt their highway up and down the tree trunk. I discovered fly paper. I secure the fly paper to the tree trunk with push pins and seal any gaps with Vaseline. BRAVO! It works! The ants just gather in larger and larger numbers above and below the fly paper and seem to ponder how to defeat this latest challenge. So far, their engineers remain stumped on how to resolve this problem. And I walk around my yard now free to enjoy the whole space! Life is good.

6 minutes ago, mymonkeyhusb said:

So, I figured I will somehow interrupt their highway up and down the tree trunk. I discovered fly paper. I secure the fly paper to the tree trunk with push pins and seal any gaps with Vaseline.

Brilliant! Genius , simply genius. But you can]t do that to every tree. 

so have you considered  tapping fly paper to your legs do they cant climb up them and get to those sensitives areas , where the last thing we want is ants?  

 

Seriously the tape idea is a good one, but if yours are anything like mine, they have special force Units the jump of the Tree.

I have a mango tree with some low branches, and when I cut the grass, if I make a mistake and hit the tree they jump on me.  

Perfumed Talcum powder, it messes up their GPS and they will not cross it. Put it around the base of the tree.

 

Just a suggestion, it worked well for me.

1 hour ago, mymonkeyhusb said:

The ants have come back after a number of weeks. I think if an insect could be intelligent, it would be these ants. They've built their nests very high up in my golden chain tree where I can't get to them with a fiery torch.

 

The nest-building is seasonal. The eggs are a real delicacy: depending on where you live, your neighbors might have an interest to get the nests down for their content.

 

I see little chance of starving down nests high up in the tree by glueing up the trunk.

 

However, the suggestion of CharlieH also works really well, and cheaply so, if you want to protect door and window openings to your house. In addition, regular sweeping around your house perimeter disturbs the ant's scent tracks (there is a reason why monks do it daily around their abode at the temple; prevents scorpions and centipedes housing in the leaf litter, too, whose bite is a lot worse than from the ants).