Ants

[Wolf]

So it jut rained yesterday, and now I've found my stash of food raided by ants.  Mostly going after my honeys, but everything was all together, so they were on everything.

Looked up a few natural remedies, though I didn't have most of them, I did have some cinnamon powder that wasn't covered in ants. 
Turns out ants HATE cinnamon powder.

All I had to do was sprinkle it over my stuff, and on the ants' trails, and they scattered like they couldn't stand the stuff.

So if anyone wants a natural repellant, just sprinkle a little bit of cinnamon powder around and they won't come anywhere near.  I tried both an organic most likely heat-dried cinnamon, as well as an organic cinnamon that claims to be raw, and both seemed to work the same, though I only tried a tiny bit of the claimed raw cinnamon, because I didn't want to waste it.. but I poured the heat-dried cinnamon everywhere.

[RawZi]

    What about eating the ants along with the honey?

    Isn't cinnamon a skin and eye irritant?  I might be concerned if you have dogs and cats.

[Techydude]

Yeah cinnamon irritates which is why its a good repellent .

I think garlic would work to insects hate it, some org garlic powder sprinkled around or consuming garlic so insects don't bite you.

Essential oils maybe too but they make me itch so I don't use them.

[Wolf]

I don't think cinnamon has ever irritated my skin before.  I've never gotten it in my eyes before though, but I think most things would hurt getting them in your eyes, so yeah..

I don't have any pets.

[raw-al]

Actually although an irritant, cinnamon also helps with sugar issues. Although that shouldn't be an issue with a RPDer.

I also find the presence of cinnamon in the air as an irritant to my nose.

[Modern Primate]

   What about eating the ants along with the honey?

Yes!!! That's what I thought this topic was about (eating ants). Insects are incredibly healthy, great apes eat tons of them all the time. I'm not sure if ants or ant-like creatures are the same as the termites that chimps etc. eat, but I don't see why they would be so different (if there aren't ants there in the first place).

Unfortunately though there is no way I would eat them in the modern world because who knows what types of pesticides, effluent, microorganisms etc. they are picking up. What is all this dust that is around houses doing to them, what about sprays etc. Eating one or two might be fine, eating twenty plus might be incredibly toxic. In fact I've that the housefly is the most dangerous animal to humans in modern times because of the pathogens it has. Obviously, great apes do not get sick and die routinely after eating hundreds of insects, but I'm just musing over why we can't eat them raw as-is.   

Recently I've been wondering about little flies and insects and what human activity must be doing to their life cycle. It must have upset it in so many ways, many must have mutated and evolved along with humans. This could then affect some other life cycle of other bacteria/organisms, even the ones within us. Almost anything can happen when you throw a spanner in the works of an ecological system like humans are doing.  
  

[Wolf]

I won't eat ants, I'm not much of a bug-eater.. grosses me out, even though eating raw meat has never in my life grossed me out, lol. 

But yeah, even if it didn't gross me out, I'd be concerned about the ants not being organic and natural-fed, because who knows what they're getting into in other people
s houses or trash cans..

[raw-al]

hmmm organic grass fed ants.... 

[miles]

I've eaten natural fed ants in Sweden, and their eggs.

[raw-al]

Just curious.... You must have had to eat a lot to notice that you had eaten any unless ants are a different size there. Here ants are very small.

[miles]

Well I had nothing better to do so I was eating them for quite some time. They bite and hold on to anything that goes near their nest - My hand, a stick, my feet etc.. I didn't get much from them but it was something.

They have some sort of acid or something, and my SAS guide said to cook them to neutralise it(the guide says to eat termites(and most other things) raw, on the other hand), but it(the acid) just tasted like vinegar to me and I thought it would be too much effort to collect them all together for cooking anyway.

I got the eggs with a technique I'd seen on a Ray Mears show, but didn't get many anyway.

[RawZi]

    Excuse me Wolf if this is gross. M.P., I have fermented bison tongue and other meats that got houseflies growing on it. I ate some of the maggots. Nothing bad happened to me. When on RAFDs for a while, the whole disease germ nonsense you realize is blown way out of proportion by crazies.

[quote author=Modern Primate link=topic=5525.msg74554#msg74554 date=13
Yes!!ousefly is the most dangerous animal to humans in modern times because of the pathogens it has. Obviously, great apes do not get sick and die routinely after eating hundreds of insects, but I'm just musing over why we can't eat them raw as-is.   

Recently I've been wondering about little flies and insects and what human activity must be doing to their

 life cycle. It must have upset it in so many ways, many must have mutated and evolved along with humans. This could then affect some other life cycle of other bacteria/organisms, even the ones within us. Almost anything can happen when you throw a spanner in the works of an ecological system like humans are doing.  
  
[/quote]

[RawZi]

    I used to eat ants. Not many. It wasn't for hunger either. I guess it was fun. But then I hit school age and just didn't bother again.

[Wolf]

You can talk about eating all the bugs you want, even maggots, I have nothing against bug eaters, it mostly just grosses me out to think of myself eating them.  Other people eating them won't gross me out so much, unless I would hve to watch someone eat a spider or spider-like bug, because I have a bad arachnophobia and that would just freak me out more than gross me out.  But otherwise doesn't bother me much unless to think only of myself eating them.

I'm sure bugs are probably a pretty healthy raw diet, if you can find bugs eating a natural diet rather than bugs which have feasted upon human waste such as rotting cooked foods and garbage.. although it would be interesting to see if anyone here would do an experiment of eating only raw bugs to see if it is sustainable for humans to live on insects alone, and how well they would feel on such a diet.

[Dorothy]

   I have fermented bison tongue and other meats that got houseflies growing on it. I ate some of the maggots. Nothing bad happened to me. When on RAFDs for a while, the whole disease germ nonsense you realize is blown way out of proportion by crazies.

How did the maggots taste Zi?

I wonder much about this whole disease germ nonsense too. I'm going to be raising black soldier fly maggots for my chickens and I would like to ask neighbors to deposit their food scraps in too and if they don't eat pristinely I wonder if that would do much of anything to the maggots. I wish there were some scientific studies I could find on the subject. The maggots seem to destroy any bad bacteria that would be in the compost to make healthy soil to grow vegetables in, but I cannot find out if any of the bacteria stays in the maggots themselves. BSFlies do not carry the diseases like houseflies do.

Just because an animal eats something that would be bad for us, but is good for them, doesn't necessarily mean that eating the animal is bad. Might be the same for bugs or even more so if they have the capability to destroy what is bad for us. Besides, if we generally eat very well, our immune systems "should" be able to handle a wide-variety of toxins/bacteria/parasites etc. Being exposed to small amounts would just make our immune systems even stronger if we are getting the nutrition we need.

There are large ant mounds in the south so getting a big meal would be fairly easy. Most species of ants do not travel long distances for food so if the area is generally pesticide free the ants should be fine. Just a tiny bit of cinnamon does get rid of ants. Many of the natural things that repel ants do so because the strong aroma interferes with their ability to communicate with one another.

[raw-al]

Dorothy
Have you checked out the farmer with his chickenmobiles? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BIbXU5iR2P4  Joe Salatin - Polyface farms. He has a very interesting character who has a fascinating way to raise animals. The chickens eat all the grubs and so forth that grows on the cow manure. This is a small part of his ingenious methods of farming that have made him famous. Read about him in his books or in Michael pollen http://www.amazon.com/Botany-Desire-Plants-Eye-View-World/dp/0375760393
It will open your eyes on how farming should be done.

[Dorothy]

Thanks for that video. Inspiring. I saw him in Food Inc right? Such an incredibly cool guy.

Where I live there is this wonderful man that makes these chicken tractors for people with small amounts of land. They are on wheels so you can just pick it up and move it from place to place in your yard if you don't have a fence - and he makes bigger ones to be taken with tractors from spot to spot on a larger tract of land for the chickens to plow looking for bugs and fertilize the earth piece by piece before planting. He even makes one with a removable bed that catches all the poops that you grow your vegetables in directly. It's like a rotating chicken poop composter.

I'm amazed at how many farmers and their supporters and backyard growers like me there are around these parts that embrace these views. It's what makes it possible for me to eat RAFs. I hope it spreads everywhere.