Ants wreak havoc on lighting systems
Recently, a potential customers questioned the value of spending a little extra time and money protecting their outdoor electrical systems and lights from fire ants. Those ants may seem tiny but they can cause a huge problem to your landscape lighting system. In the Guru’s experience servicing lighting systems, one of the biggest problems we see is ants nesting in one of the electrical components.
In Texas alone, costs associated with fire ant damages to electrical and communications equipment totaled $146.5 million per year (Source: Texas A&M University). And it’s not just fire ants, other ant species are attracted to your outdoor lighting. This can short out your entire outdoor lighting system and it will require a service technician to check all the connections and fixtures to find the source of the problem and fix it.
It may not sound like a big deal, but the ants can actually ruin the equipment by either chewing through the components or bringing in dirt to create a nest leading to moisture issues. Ants love electricity. Everything from A/C units to water well electrical components are on their list of things to destroy. Not only does it cause damage to the equipment but it also is a safety concern.
There are various opinions on why the ants are attracted to electrical components but the key to fixing the issue is through prevention. We now have an ant preventative that we add to new systems and can add to maintain and protect existing systems. They are added to every tree mounted fixture, every jbox, every power post and every transformer.
Another prevention technique used by Landscape Lighting Guru is improving the wire connections which are a common access point for ants. We use heat shrink connections instead of wire nuts to help prevent ants access to the wire. Not only does this improved connectivity, but it also will not allow insects (Ants) getting in. Additionally it will prevent all the corrosive elements that can deteriorate in your system.
Last but not least is best prevention technique is to have regularly scheduled maintenance to reapply the pesticide and look for any potential problems. Ants can be an easy fix if you catch it before they have done damage. When we provide yearly maintenance we have been able to prevent expensive damage and outages.
Don’t let ants ruin your professionally installed landscape lighting system. Protect your investment by keeping the ants out! We offer lighting maintenance service plans for existing systems that includes the ant treatment. To see the damage ants can do, check out a few videos from a few of our recent service calls. If we can help you with your lighting, please give us a call 210-710-7737.
