Have you ever woken up to find a tiny army of ants slowly taking over your kitchen?
They may be small in size, but pesky ants can cause huge issues when they decide to make your home their own. While bug sprays and chemicals can be an effective way of killing them and keeping them out of your home, a viral hack is currently sending the internet into meltdown. The best part is it uses something you’ve probably already got around the home – especially if you’re a grandparent.
Sharing the cheap and affordable tip on Twitter, Christine Fox explained that ants simply hate chalk.
“Ants hate chalk,” she wrote. “Draw a chalk ring around your drink or outline your coasters and they won’t cross the line.”
https://twitter.com/ChristineFox_/status/1014302198702850049
Christine showed her 39.9 thousand Twitter followers a photo of how she’d drawn chalk on her coasters, as well as another picture which showed a couple of ants avoiding a line drawn in chalk. It’s not the first time the hack has proven effective when it comes to ants.
In 2013, a YouTube user named Grace Lee shared a video online where she drew circles around the ants. Just as Christine suggested, the ants were extremely hesitant to cross the lines drawn in chalk.
In response to Christine’s hack, others on social media began sharing their own tips.
One person wrote: Also nutmeg. Keeps them away from my kitchen”.
Another said everything from vinegar to baking soda and ground cinnamon to chilli powder kept ants away.
A further message read: “Any powder works. Ants can’t stand powder on their feet. Baby powder, baking powder, comet, whatever”.
Read more: How to get rid of pesky ants naturally
The post even captured the attention of TV vet and Living Room host Chris Brown, who said the hack could also prevent ants from getting into your pet’s food bowl.
“Thankfully this completely chemical free tip couldn’t be easier,” he wrote. “It simply involves drawing a line of chalk around the bowls. And the science seems to stack up. Because ants follow scent trails, the chalk not only interrupts their ‘food freeway’ to that bowl, but also provides a dry barrier to their onward journey”.
Starts at 60 previously reported that citrus scents can also keep ants away, mainly because it’s quite harmful to ants. Scattering herbs and spices such as mint, black pepper and even garlic give of strong smells that ants can’t stand.