We have nice wasps, too. When we first planted the corn, Mr. Sg noticed little ants around the roots when the corn looked unhealthy. There’s supposed to be an invasion of “crazy ants” in the humid southeast US. They don’t follow behavior patterns of normal ants, and they reportedly eat electronics. Needless to say, we put food-grade diatomaceous earth all over the place and the little devils disappeared. Do you think those could be the problem?
Could be. Could be some 'off-brand' ants. They're pretty controllable if so. Down here (because DE and borax simply are not available, unless you spend approx. a whole day to go into Panama City...and sometimes not then), flower gardeners simply bomb the hell out of the ants with Terro or some other organophosphate. Herb and food gardeners (generally) prefer to use a solution of vinegar, coffee grounds, cinnamon, garlic, black pepper and hot pepper. It works just fine, but in the rainy season one has to apply it a couple-three times a week.
Ants, just btw, hate the devil out of cinnamon -- everywhere, so I'm told. And, cinnamon is way cheap here, too. Me, I'd rather use a 3:2 mix of sugar and powdered borax. Kills the little bastids right after they eat it...and they apparently like to feed it to queens, too. Awwwwww, too bad.
Many thanks for your thoughts!