New Type Of Ants Invade Pearland

PEARLAND, Texas -- It does not take long to find a different type of ant just south of Houston in Pearland, KPRC Local 2 reported Wednesday.

An exterminator said the ants are getting easier and easier to find, but are impossible to get rid of.

"There you go," said Tom Rasberry of Budget Pest Control. "I don't actually get rid of them. You're not going to. We can reduce the populations and create buffer zones to keep them from being so bad that you can't live in your house."

These ants are different. They are called crazy Rasberry ants, after the man who discovered them about six years ago. They're hairy and reddish-brown in color.

Rasberry said they invade electrical systems, overwhelm homes and clog pumps. The normal ant controls do not work.

It's not enough just to kill the queen. Experts say each colony has multiple queens that have to be taken out.

Rasberry said, "My biggest concern was that they were going to spread throughout the Gulf Coast region and have devastating effects on the ecological system."

The ants have been spotted in five counties in the Houston area. Experts said they may have arrived on a cargo ship docked at the Port of Houston.

"At this point, it would be nearly impossible to eradicate the ant because it is so widely dispersed," said Roger Gold, a Texas A&M University entomologist.

Scientists are not sure exactly where the ants came from, but their cousins, commonly called crazy ants, are found in the Southeast and the Caribbean.

Crazy Rasberry ants eat fire ants and like to suck the sweet juices from plants, feed on such beneficial insects as ladybugs, and eat the hatchlings of a small, endangered type of grouse known as the Attwater prairie chicken.

They also bite humans, though not with a stinger like fire ants.

The Texas Department of Agriculture is working with A&M researchers and the Environmental Protection Agency on how to stop the ants.