How to protect honey jar from ants?

Question

Is there any technique to prevent ants from getting into a honey jar? The outside of the jar is covered with dead ants every day.

Currently, I am wiping the surface of jar with a wet cloth before opening the lid, but I still see dead ants inside the lid, too. (They are not in the honey itself, though.)

The comments were a good laugh, but I had to clean up because they became distracting. — rumtscho, Aug 20 '14 at 12:23

The Hungry Dictator · Accepted Answer · 2016-02-10T05:54:25.143

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Here are a few options:

Make a salt barrier around the jar.
Keep jar in a bowl full of water.
Use air-tight container (doesn't need to be a jar).

Any of the above should keep ants away from your honey.

edited Feb 10 '16 at 05:54

answered Aug 19 '14 at 07:19

The Hungry Dictator

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In my grandmothers old house, she used to have a cupboard on legs where all the attracting foods went into. It was placed a few centimetres away fem the wall and all four legs were placed in little metals bowls with water in them. Never saw an ant in there. – Megasaur Aug 19 '14 at 10:55
Water jar defense is easily defeated by winged ant foragers (they are built once a year by many/most ant colonies) – Mischa Arefiev Aug 19 '14 at 11:05
The above suggestions are great. You might try a "Cream of Tartar" barrier. Also a "Zip Lock" bag, or a sealable plastic container large enough to stand the jar in. – Optionparty Aug 19 '14 at 14:38
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I haven't heard of the 'cream of tartar' barrier ... when I have ants, I leave out a small bowl of sugar, then once the ants have found it, add borax to it. (note that you don't want to kill off all ants ... just the ones in the house ... the ones outside keep termites away) – Joe Aug 19 '14 at 15:04
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@MischaArefiev I've neither seen nor heard of any ants that make "winged foragers" on a yearly basis in my part of the world. There are the breeding males and females that emerge once a year for carpenter ants, but a honey pot isolated by water hardly makes a suitable nest (which is what the females are looking for -- the males just seek to breed and die), and the female would likely not be inclined to linger with lack of a suitable nesting material. – Doktor J Aug 19 '14 at 15:23
@megasaur - yah that 4 leg stwnd is also good enough but that wont protect from.snts as ants can climb those legs and can reac to the jar.. But if there is cleanliness in that area like no licking jar not a single drop of honey lying on outer part of the jar etc. So we need to take care all those things. And one more thing earlier people used to hang sweets and honey on the ceiling so that they wont come in contact of any of the insects. – The Hungry Dictator Aug 19 '14 at 18:03
Make a diatomaceous earth barrier (you can even eat it) http://wolfcreekranch1.tripod.com/defaq.html. * Keep it in the fridge.

Chloe

Aug 20 '14 at 01:08

The water barrier doesn't work for me. I live in the tropics and in the wet season have a small pot of honey placed in a jar with water. I still at times get ants on the jar. Can they swim? – Jul 24 '15 at 01:50

@Corine May be ... You can try border of Salt around the jar though.. – The Hungry Dictator Jul 29 '15 at 09:34

score 4 · Answer 2 · answered Aug 19 '14 at 13:24

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It is possible that the outside of your jar has honey residue on it. Try rinsing off the outside of your jar with warm water. I would also give the cabinet the honey is in a good cleaning as well, as I'm sure there is honey residue in there now as well.

I would also try to track the source of these ants and stop them from entering your house at all.

answered Aug 19 '14 at 13:24

TheGremlyn

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Even if we rinse off outside of the jar, I am sure ants will still get attracted. and also we should be lucky to have only one or two source from where ants are coming :) – Mr_Green Aug 19 '14 at 16:28

score 3 · Answer 3 · answered Aug 19 '14 at 14:18

I have had this problem, and fixed it in two different ways:

Put the jar into a large ziploc bag. Make sure the bag is tightly sealed. This works well for larger, heavy glass honey jars. Plastic honey jars are too light when they are nearly empty, and the bag tends to tip over in the cabinet and be clumsy to handle.
At one point we had two plastic honey jars open. It was more convenient to put them into a plastic storage container that had an airtight seal.

score 2 · Answer 4 · answered Aug 20 '14 at 16:32

I've had this problem and the "clean the jar and the cabinet" (and all of the paths they take, as much as you can to the entry points) advice is what worked for me (as @TheGremlyn states in their answer).

I've also relocated my honey near my spices after observing that area was always devoid of ants. I'm not sure if the spices actually repelled the ants but that area of my cabinet is quite aromatic with custom curry blends, pickling spices, anjwain (strong thyme like), fennel, cloves, pepper/chili, cumin, and many others. There's also spice "dust" on the shelves from the constant shuffling/opening/closing/use.

How often does your ant problem re-occur? After cleaning up, temporarily re-locate the jar for awhile until the ants have stopped sending their scouts in to check. Then put it back in its normal place.

Are there any other items near the honey that may be attracting the ants? If so, temporarily relocate those items too.

score 0 · Answer 5 · answered Jul 08 '21 at 23:40

I don't want to hoist my honey out of some hard to access covering or container as I use it frequently. Changing the spot I keep it in seems to work. Re the water idea which also works - put the honey in a container first and then in a tray of water (to counteract a dripping jar).

score 0 · Answer 6 · answered Aug 20 '14 at 09:07

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Draw a continuous line of chalk around the surface the jar is standing on. It must be an unbroken line.

answered Aug 20 '14 at 09:07

David

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Bonus: this tip is also effective against ghost Pooh bears. – Preston Aug 20 '14 at 15:37

score 0 · Answer 7 · edited Jul 24 '15 at 03:01

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You have to put the honey jar in foil so that the ants can't smell it. Make sure that the whole thing is covered in the foil.

edited Jul 24 '15 at 03:01

Cascabel

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answered Jul 11 '15 at 06:57

Chloe

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score 0 · Answer 8 · answered Aug 29 '15 at 19:10

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It is a joy to use honey dippers--slows me down to reduce stress too :)--and there are so many interesting and creative honey servers with openings for them! After researching sealed options and generally unfavorable comments for many hours, I've decided to give up and use a 4qt pop-top type container [like oxo]. I can see the jar, store the honey dipper in the jar as designed and seal it all from pesky intruders. I hope it works well...I'm looking forward to finding new servers and never considering pests again!

answered Aug 29 '15 at 19:10

APR

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I'm not sure how this answers the question at all. The OP makes no mention of honey dippers in the question. – Catija Aug 31 '15 at 05:46
@Catija it does get there in a roundabout fashion: store the jar inside a larger (ant-proof) container. – Erica Sep 01 '15 at 12:11

How to protect honey jar from ants?

8 Answers8