Use This Kitchen Staple To Keep Annoying Ants At Bay

If you've never dealt with ants in your house before, we envy you. Once they find an in, these little buggers are determined to make a nuisance of themselves, getting into every nook and cranny that isn't sealed to the high heavens and calling all of their friends in to get a slice of that sweet pie (both metaphorically and sometimes literally). Getting rid of ants can be a pain, too. After all, you don't want to go spraying toxic chemicals and pesticides in a place you store and prepare food, right? If you're looking for a safe way to deter ants from flowing into your kitchen, we've got a secret to share. You just need black pepper to fend them off.

That's right. That delicious black pepper that you use to top your bacon or even season your black coffee (a real thing, since black pepper works to counteract coffee's bitterness) can also be used to defend your kitchen from these tiny menaces. You can simply sprinkle ground black pepper around any entry point you've noticed ants coming from, such as windowsills and baseboards. Mixing 1 part black pepper to 10 parts water also creates a potent liquid solution that you can spray in these areas for some extra protection, too. Here's a colorful spray bottle three-pack on Amazon that makes the job even easier.

It's good to know that you can use this kitchen staple to ward off annoying ants, but the "why" behind how black pepper works to deter ants is also pretty fascinating. You see, ants leave a chemical scent trail whenever they find food, and their little compatriots just follow the smell to find their way to and from this new stockpile. Black pepper radiates a pungent aroma to the ant populace, though. 

By sprinkling or spritzing the stuff around your kitchen, you break up those scent trails, making it impossible for ants to find your food. In short, black pepper is an easy way to totally defeat an ant's ability to tell its friends where the party's at, and you probably don't even have to hit up the store for it. As a bonus, the common spice is harmless to people and non-toxic to dogs in small amounts, though you'll want to skip this method if you have a cat, since it contains a compound called piperine that can irritate a cat's stomach and lungs. 

Black pepper also doesn't kill ants, so you may want to consult pest control if that's your goal. But if you're just trying to ward them away from your kitchen using a safe substance, the spice really can't be beat. After all, you can interrupt the ant parade with just one sprinkle of the stuff, and then turn around and use what's left in your cacio e pepe for dinner. If you want another line of defense, flour also works against ants. And more more non-toxic solutions, are 15 common pantry staples that will keep kitchen pests away.