Ants in my mealworms!

[TebowHammer]

Last night I bought a 100 count of mealies for Nala along with a bottle of Fluker's gut load.

I placed the mealies in a Tupperware container, drilling air holes in the lid. I mixed in my gut load with the oat flakes that the mealies come in and placed a couple of pieces of potato in it for a water source.

I placed them in the room with Nala on a separate stand, giving them 12 hours to eat before I started feeding them to Nala.

When I went to get them this morning I noticed the container was covered with what I call fruit ants - the super tiny ants that only come out when food's been left out.

They had gotten into the container and had already devoured a couple of mealies. Needless to say, I had to throw them all out.

I've never seen these ants in my house before and I'm perplexed as to what attracted them in the first place: the mealies, the gut load, the potatoes?

Has anyone else experienced this? Any pointers on preventing it in the future?

If it happened inside, I can only imagine what would happen if I placed them inside!

Let me know what you think! Thanks!

 

[acpart]

I get carpenter ants in the early summer in my cricket containers that are going after the grain. One thing that seems to work to keep them out is to spray the outside top 2" or so of the mealworm container with spray oil so the ants can't climb all the way up.

Aliza