Lawn Diseases
Fire Ants in Lawns: Kill the Colony, Not the Mound
Treating fire ants in lawns by drenching the mound kills workers and moves the colony. Bait reaches the queen — that difference is why most attempts fail.
Fire Ant Bait (granular)
Amdro Fire Ant Killer Bait Granules Review
★★★★★ 4.5/5
our editor rating how we score4.6/5 from 6,456 shoppers at Amazon — their number, not ours.
$19–$24
Typical price · 2 lb treats up to 130 mounds as a mound treatment
Affiliate links — see our disclosure. Commissions never influence verdicts.
A bait, not a contact killer — which is the whole difference between moving a fire ant colony and ending it.
Our Verdict
Fire ants are the pest most often 'treated' and least often killed, because a contact insecticide poured on a mound kills workers and prompts the colony to relocate a few feet away. A bait works the other way round: foragers carry hydramethylnon back and feed it to the queen, and without a laying queen the colony collapses. That is slower and far less satisfying than watching a mound go quiet, and it is the approach that actually works. Two rules decide the outcome — apply to dry ground when ants are actively foraging, and do not water it in, because bait is food and wet bait stops being attractive. Worth knowing this is a fire ant product specifically; it is not a lawn insecticide and does nothing for grubs, chinch bugs or webworms.
✅ Pros
- Bait reaches the queen, so the colony dies instead of relocating
- One 2 lb jug covers a lot of mounds — cheap per mound treated
- No sprayer, no mixing, no whole-lawn application
- Targets ants rather than broadcasting a broad-spectrum insecticide over the turf
⚠️ Cons
- Slow — expect weeks, not the same-day collapse a contact product fakes
- Must go down dry and stay dry; rain or irrigation ruins the bait
- Useless against every other lawn pest, including grubs
- Ants must be actively foraging, so cold or very hot ground wastes the application
Product type
Fire Ant Bait (granular)
Active ingredient
Hydramethylnon 0.73% (Group 20 insecticide)
Price range
$19–$24
Coverage
2 lb treats up to 130 mounds as a mound treatment
Best for
Fire ant mounds in Southern lawns, where killing the queen matters more than killing workers
our editor rating
4.5 out of 5
Where our facts come from
Label read on EPA's label database
EPA Reg. No. 73342-1
We opened this product's accepted label on EPA's own Pesticide Product Label System — the strongest source available for what a product is registered to do.
What we found when we read it
Label read 2026-08-02 on EPA PPLS (accepted 2024-04-08). 'AMDRO FIRE ANT BAIT', EPA Reg. 73342-1, hydramethylnon 0.73%, IRAC Group 20. Note Amdro sells several hydramethylnon products at different strengths on different registrations — Yard Treatment at 0.036% (73342-5), Ant Block at 1.0%, Lawn and Garden bait at 0.9% — so the strength and rate depend on which pack you have and the registration number is the only reliable way to tell them apart.
Where this page and the container disagree, the container wins — the label is the legal authority on rates and restrictions. How to read one yourself.
Where This Product Matters
Matched against each state's actual disease, weed and pest pressure.
Alabama
Alabama hub →Fire ants (they entered the country at Mobile, and Alabama has lived with them longest)
Arkansas
Arkansas hub →Fire ants
California
California hub →Red imported fire ants, a quarantined pest since arriving in 1998 — infesting Orange, Los Angeles, Riverside, San Bernardino and to a lesser extent San Diego counties, with the regulated area covering Orange County and portions of Los Angeles and Riverside rather than the state; CDFA runs a reporting hotline for finds outside it
Florida
Florida hub →Red imported fire ants, plus the less common native tropical fire ant — UF/IFAS records mounds in open sunny lawns and nesting under patio slabs, sidewalk edges and electrical boxes
Georgia
Georgia hub →Fire ants (statewide, mounds year-round)
Louisiana
Louisiana hub →Fire ants
Mississippi
Mississippi hub →Fire ants
Nevada
Nevada hub →Ants
New Mexico
New Mexico hub →Red imported fire ants in isolated instances only, with Dona Ana County under quarantine: nursery stock, sod, soil, baled hay and straw, and soil-moving equipment leaving the county must be certified free of the pest
North Carolina
North Carolina hub →Red imported fire ants, with NCDA&CS running its own quarantine that restricts moving plant products from infested areas into non-infested ones; NC State records only Solenopsis invicta here, with no hybrid
Oklahoma
Oklahoma hub →Fire ants (southeastern counties)
South Carolina
South Carolina hub →Imported fire ants, which Clemson treats on a two-bait-per-year calendar rather than on demand
Tennessee
Tennessee hub →Imported fire ants, first confirmed as an isolated Shelby County infestation in 1948 and now covered by a Tennessee Department of Agriculture quarantine whose county list is reissued as the range moves; UT Extension publishes the two-step bait method as SP419
Texas
Texas hub →Fire ants
Virginia
Virginia hub →Imported fire ants, including the hybrid Virginia Tech publishes on separately, under a VDACS quarantine that has expanded in 2019, 2022 and again on 27 May 2025 and now covers 18 counties and 15 independent cities rather than the whole state
Common questions
Common Questions
How much does Amdro Fire Ant Killer Bait Granules cost?
Amdro Fire Ant Killer Bait Granules typically runs $19–$24, covering 2 lb treats up to 130 mounds as a mound treatment.
What does Amdro Fire Ant Killer Bait Granules treat?
Amdro Fire Ant Killer Bait Granules targets Fire ants.
What is the active ingredient in Amdro Fire Ant Killer Bait Granules?
Hydramethylnon 0.73% (Group 20 insecticide), registered under EPA Reg. No. 73342-1.
What is the biggest downside of Amdro Fire Ant Killer Bait Granules?
Slow — expect weeks, not the same-day collapse a contact product fakes
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