Battle as a pesticide

One colony of Argentine ants is believed to extend almost the complete length of California, stretching from San Diego to Ukiah, 100 miles north of San Francisco.

Their sheer numbers, cooperative behavior and lack of natural predators in the United States make these small, slender ants – only about 1/8 of an inch long – difficult to eradicate…

But now chemists and biologists at the University of California, Irvine, (UCI) think they may have found a natural way to finally check the spread of environmentally destructive Argentine ants in California and elsewhere in the United States: Spark a family feud.

Slight alterations in the “recognition” chemicals on the exoskeletons of these closely related pests, these scientists say, could transform “kissing cousins” into mortal enemies, triggering deadly in-fighting within their normally peaceful super colonies, which have numerous queens and can stretch hundreds of miles.