First-time home-owner – house less than 1 year old.
We had our home built last December, and have been discovering all sorts of problems with it. The latest was a trail of ants within our kitchen ascending from behind the stove. When we looked beneath the stove to see what the problem was, we found a small hole allowing sun-light in from outside. Our builder came and sprayed foam, but the ants have persisted for one more day.
I finally sprayed some insect killer behind the stove, and that greatly reduced the number of ants. Today I pulled the stove out to see what it looked like back there and found the following (see image). I'm noticing a large space between the hardwood flooring and the drywall – is this normal? Should I fill it with spray foam? If so, is spray foam enough to prevent further insects from finding their way in (assuming the initial round of spray foam wasn't sufficient), or should I deal with ants a different way?
If I should spray, what would be an appropriate product to use?
Best Answer
Killing the ants is one thing, and the comments from others are good. However, you need to fix the root cause of the problem, which is hole that you can see daylight from. Spray foam will only deter them for a while. You should NEVER be able to see daylight through a wall from the inside of a home. I would take a good look outside and see how much of a gap existed before the foamed it. You may have to remove the siding to see everything, but I suspect the exterior wall may need to be patched.