We had been really neglectful of the section of our backyard behind our garage. It had gotten really overgrown with weeds, and it was getting to be a huge pain to ever go back there to mess with the pool filter equipment if we needed to. I decided that it was time to clear that place out.
I started with a big pile of railroad ties that were stacked up on the ground. We'd dug them out of the yard from some old garden boxes that the previous homeowners had installed. I started picking up the wood, and the ants came boiling out. So I got the raid, and sprayed the whole thing down. Then I tried again, disturbed the ant hill further, and had to spray more raid.
I thought I was done finally, and started lifting boards, but it turned out the ants had a back door that just so happened to be right underneath my foot. I realized this when they started biting me. I've been bit by fire ants a lot since coming to Texas, so I was well aware of how awful this could be, and I immediately sprayed my foot down with raid.
I don't know if that's even safe or not. I may have given myself cancer by doing that or something, but I didn't want the painful, swollen, pus-filled sores that come along with fire ant bites. I went and got the hose after that, and hosed my foot down, just in case of cancer or something. Then I had to change out of my sopping wet shoes.
After the third raiding, the ants mostly went away, or at least stopped bothering me. Their nest looked like this, in several different places.
I did find another nest of them in the root ball of a tree we'd dug out of the ground but not disposed of yet as well, but I stayed away from them enough to get rid of the root ball without getting attacked.
Now, here's the before picture of the rest of that section of the backyard.
The kudzu vine had grown so much that all the weeds in the whole area were sort of woven together by it. I pushed my way back underneath the vine, and started ripping it out on the left side of the picture, and once I got that started, I was able to basically roll the whole thing up like a carpet. The weed roots would be exposed as I rolled it, and I could easily pull them as I went. It was pretty cool, except for the fact that it was over 100 degrees at the time with feel like temperatures at about 110.
In this picture, you can see I had a problem when it came time to dispose of the weeds and vines though. There was so much that I definitely couldn't fit it all in one garbage bag, but they were so woven together that I couldn't separate it into smaller bag-sized pieces. I tried clippers, but ours were all too old, rusty and dull. I tried a hedge trimmer, but the vines were too thin and squirrely to cut with that.
In the end, I had to use a freaking steak knife, and saw each bit of kudzu vine bit by bit to separate it into bags.
This picture shows the section when it was half done. The vines mostly gone, but still a bunch of weeds.
I decided at this point to get the lawnmower, and take out the rest of the weeds with that. This was probably the worst part of the job, because I wasn't in the shade of the garage anymore, and the heat was double if you're in the direct sun. And here it is, finally all cleared out:
So, Leiningen managed to defeat both the ants and the kudzu, and even the heat. It was quite a triumphant feeling to be done with it all.
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