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I have seen a few of these trundling up and down my broad beans etc - are they harmful?
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Red Ants
They are not harmful, but it probably means you have blackfly in the tips of your broad bean plants. Ants are a good indicator of blackfly, as they 'milk' them for their honeydew.
valmarg -
I have been checking them and havent seen any blackfly as yetOriginally posted by valmargComment
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Be careful not to handle them Kimbo, red ants have a nasty sting- I know they've got me several times- usually when I've been crouched down in shorts & flip flops & they've run over my legs! They set up nests which can also undermine plants by destroying the root system so if you find a nest of them pour boiling water over the eggs to kill them if it's next to anything precious (not very nice & I usually live & let live but they ruined my small alpine bed)
Into every life a little rain must fall.Comment
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Red Ants
Sorry KIMBO, but we have a Stella cherry tree, and the first signs of cherry blackfly are the ants running up and down the bole of the tree.
Big sigh of relief that you have not got blackfly on your broad beans. The ants must have being doing an unsuccessful recce to see if the blackfly was where they expected them to be, if that makes sense?
valmargComment
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apparently they also protect aphids from other insect preditors - something to do with them liking a sweet secretion the aphids produce -so you get nasty bites and greenfly too!How can a woman be expected to be happy with a man who insists on treating her as if she were a perfectly normal human being.”
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