Ants are one of the most abundance animals on the planet. So chances are no matter where you live you have ants close to your house and bird feeders. This is not a bad thing. Ants are responsible for the pollination and planting of many of the plants we enjoy and benefit from. For example did you know that ants are the only animal that sows trillium seeds? So next time you are looking at some beautiful trillium flowers on a spring day remember that ants planted all those bulbs. While they provide us with many wonderful things in our backyards it can be annoying when they take a liking to our bird feeders. Ants typically enjoy bird foods that are sticky and sweet such as nectar (for hummingbirds, orioles and butterflies), Jelly (for oriole) and fruit. Sometime they may be a little more adventures and eat suet; however this is typically suet flavours with fruit in them. Perhaps the ant’s greatest strength is their numbers; however their greatest weakness is water.

Here is Our One and Only Rule for Keeping out Ants:

1. Use Ant Moats: Yes, it’s that simple. Ants cannot swim or make it across places where water is a few centimeters in depth so keeping them away from you feeders is actually quite simple. You can either buy a bird feeder with built in ant moats or you can attach an ant moat to an existing feeder. Many of our WBU Hummingbird, Oriole and Butterfly Feeders come with ant moats built into the feeders themselves, all you have to do is fill the moat with water and you are ready to go. You can also purchase a separate ant moat that easily attaches to most feeders. We even carry an ant moat that fits onto our Advanced Pole System® (APS) so that ants cannot travel up your pole system to access your feeders. The best part about using an ant moat is that many other animals benefit from them. We have had many reports of customers observing a wide variety of bird species bathing or drinking from the water in the ant moat. We have even had people tell us they have had birds eat the insects right out of the moat. Ant moats are also helpful for stopping other insects from getting in your feeders including earwigs. Make sure you clean out your ant moats regularly as they can collect a lot of bugs and the water can evaporate quickly in the heat. Here are some products we carry with built in ant moats as well as some ant moats themselves: