Lawn Care Phase XII: Starvation Bait

I love a nice lawn, and there was a time when I had no problem throwing chemical fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides at it to get the results I wanted. Years ago, though, I decided this practice must in some way be bad for the environment, and it obviously couldn’t be healthy for humans or pets (diazinon - *cough*). Every year since, I’ve worked towards eliminating these substances, while preserving thick, green grass.

Now it is, well, a collection of implemented half-baked ideas; The ones that worked, that is.

One lawn is composed of a modified strain of Zoysia Japonica, which is so invasive it chokes out everything else, including crabgrass and weeds. The downside to this lawn, the family agrees, is that it isn’t as "barefootable" as "normal people’s" lawns. So, the "happy feet" lawn is Kentucky Bluegrass, which grows thick enough to resist weeds, but not crabgrass.

To fertilize both lawns I mist them with kerosene and torch them before they turn green in spring (the neighbors love this). This approach is based on my observation that the grass grows greener where the bonfire was. This process also de-thatches and *apparently* cooks the crabgrass before it hatches.

For grubs, Bacillus popilliae has been added to the soil. This stuff is great. The spores multiply inside the grubs, killing them, then lay dormant in the soil for up to 15 years, waiting to attack.

I no longer need nasty chemical fertilizers, crabgrass killers, weed killers, or grub killers. What I do need is something for ants. I’ve been using outdoor ant stakes, which are poison baits. The ants take the bait back to the nest, share it, and die. These work great, and don’t use large quantities of poison, but kids like them because they look like little UFO toys, so they have to go anyway, never mind my poison-free endeavor.

Introducing Starvation Baits:

An improvised starvation bait housing is made from an upside-down plastic deli container with a lid. A small plastic (take-out) salad dressing cup is glued to the underside of the lid, such that it is facing up when the deli container is upside-down. Holes are drilled in the deli container near the lid so the ants can come and go, but the rain wont get in.

The cup is filled with sucralose, a non-caloric sweetener made from sugar. The reason it’s considered non-caloric is that it can’t be broken down like sucrose. It can’t be metabolized, therefore it has no calories.

The ants can feast on these tasty offerings all they like, guide other ants to it as ants do, and of course, feed the queen. All will starve.

No more poisons.