Ants in Palm Trees?

[EJ;)]

Good afternoon fellow Palm Addicts, 

This weekend I had planned on putting some beautiful palms in the ground in my front yard. 

Unfortunately, replacing one that did not make it. I live in Northern CA zone 9b out by the delta waterways. 

Upon removal of the dead palm tree, i noticed that an ant colony had moved in under the root ball of the palm. 

Is this something i need to worry about? Could they have killed my palm? Will they move on to anther palm in my yard?

Never had issues with this before???? HELP! 

 

[Reyes Vargas]

We need pictures of the ants.  If they are just fire or red ants they do not kill trees.  There are carpenter ants but I've never heard of them harming palms.  I think they prefer conifers and hardwoods.  They don't actually kill the tree They just burrow in the tree and that can weaken a tree.

[mnorell]

Ants don't kill palms, but they will move into the beautiful and spacious quarters provided them by a rotting palm (or any other plant for that matter) and use their rotting tissue. This is a very similar situation to those who see sow-bugs, earwigs, et al. in the crowns of their palms and start killing them in a panic, when these are natural and peaceful detrivores, i.e., they are just there to eat already-dead tissue...usually the rotten crown/meristem area of a cold-damaged (or killed) tree. You should avoid killing them as they are part of the natural ecosystem and not harming your plants at all. It is similar to the way maggots are used to debride human wounds, since they naturally eat the rotten tissues and leave the "live" stuff alone.

Now of course if you happen to have a nest of fire ants, you will probably want to choose a different spot for your replacement tree. No amount of ant-poison will kill out a fire-ant colony since it is a many-pronged subterranean palace, in many cases with multiple queens, sometimes spanning an acre or more. Best to let them aerate your soil in the old spot (perhaps the only reason they can be thanked) and keep yourself some feet away, since you will want to give them wide berth! 

From a pest-control website: "Imported fire ant colonies can have a single queen or multiple queens. Single-queen colonies are territorial in nature, limiting populations to approximately 150 mounds containing 7 million ants per acre. Multiple-queen colonies tend to share resources and are tolerant of other colonies in close proximity. These characteristics may allow for up to 300 mounds and 40 million ants per acre."