Hear from Our Customers
Most people who call us have already tried the spray from the hardware store on Merrick Boulevard. It knocked back the trail they could see and within a week, the ants were back. That’s not a product failure. That’s a strategy failure. Sprays hit foragers. They don’t touch the colony, and the colony is the whole problem.
When ant control in Laurelton is done right, you stop finding trails across your kitchen counter in the morning. You stop seeing them along the basement walls after it rains. That second one matters here specifically southeast Queens gets hit with heavy rain events that saturate outdoor nests fast, and when that happens, ants push inside in large numbers. If the colony hasn’t been addressed, every storm becomes another infestation.
Laurelton’s housing stock also raises the stakes beyond just nuisance. These homes many of them built between the 1930s and 1960s, with wood-frame construction, aging window frames, and moisture-prone basements are prime territory for carpenter ants. Carpenter ants don’t eat wood, but they excavate it to nest. Left alone long enough in the right conditions, that’s structural damage, not just an annoyance. Getting ahead of it with professional ant removal isn’t overcautious. It’s the smarter move for a home you’ve invested in.
We were founded by Richard Kourbage and remain family-owned and operated. We’ve served the five boroughs and Long Island for over 40 years and Laurelton has been part of our service territory the entire time. We’re not a national franchise dispatching from a call center. We’re a local operator whose technicians know the difference between a Laurelton Tudor and a Flatbush brownstone, and treat them accordingly.
We hold a consistent A+ rating with the Better Business Bureau of New York State and are fully licensed, bonded, and insured. Every material we use is registered with the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation which matters when you have kids and pets in the house and you want to know exactly what’s being applied and why. We also offer a 10% senior discount, which is worth asking about when you call Laurelton has a significant population of long-term homeowners who’ve kept these blocks looking the way they do for decades, and that kind of commitment deserves to be recognized.
The first visit is a full cleanout. Materials go down both inside and outside the structure, applied in a way that lets forager ants carry the treatment back into the nest and share it with the colony. That’s the key difference between what we do and what a can of spray does one addresses the source, the other addresses the symptom.
In Laurelton, that exterior treatment matters as much as what happens inside. Many of the ant colonies affecting homes here are established outdoors in mature tree roots, landscaping timbers, or the kind of decaying wood that accumulates around older properties with established yards. Laurelton Park sits at the center of the neighborhood, and the tree-lined residential streets throughout the area create the exact outdoor environment where carpenter ant colonies get their start before sending foragers into adjacent homes. The treatment needs to account for that.
After the initial cleanout, we schedule follow-up visits weekly, every other week, or monthly depending on what the infestation calls for. Those visits re-apply materials and monitor activity until the problem is fully resolved. Ant infestations in older single-family homes often involve multiple colonies or satellite nests, and a single visit rarely ends it completely. The follow-up schedule is what actually closes the job.
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We handle ant infestations for both residential and commercial properties throughout Laurelton and the surrounding areas of Queens Community District 13. Whether you own a single-family home in Laurelton Estates, manage a unit at Laurelton Gardens, or run a business along Merrick Boulevard, the approach is the same: licensed technicians, regulated materials, and a follow-up plan that doesn’t end until the infestation does.
Our ant control services cover the full range of species common to this part of southeast Queens pavement ants pushing up through foundation lines and driveways, odorous house ants trailing through kitchens and bathrooms, and carpenter ants establishing nests in the wood-frame structures that define Laurelton’s architectural character. For carpenter ant infestations specifically, we locate the nest within the structure, not just address visible foraging activity on the surface.
Every service starts with a free estimate. There’s no commitment required to find out what you’re dealing with and what it will take to fix it. We answer calls 24 hours a day, seven days a week so if you’re discovering an ant problem at 9 PM on a Sunday, you’re not leaving a voicemail and waiting until Monday. All materials we use are NYS DEC-registered, all our technicians are certified, and we are fully licensed, bonded, and insured. That’s the baseline not a selling point, just what working with a legitimate operator looks like.
The spray you’re using is doing exactly what it’s designed to do it kills the ants it contacts. The problem is that the ants you can see are foragers, and foragers represent a small fraction of the total colony. The queen, the larvae, and the bulk of the population are back in the nest, which could be in your walls, under your foundation, in a tree root in your yard, or in moisture-damaged wood somewhere in the structure. Spray doesn’t reach any of that.
This is especially relevant in Laurelton, where homes of this age and construction type frequently have established colonies in places that are genuinely hard to find without knowing what to look for basement sill plates, window frame voids, wood that’s been softened by years of moisture exposure. Professional ant treatment uses materials that foragers carry back into the nest themselves, targeting the colony at its source. That’s the only approach that actually ends the cycle.
Size is the first indicator. Carpenter ants are noticeably larger than the common pavement or odorous house ant worker carpenter ants typically range from a quarter inch to a half inch in length, and they’re usually black or dark reddish-brown. If you’re seeing large ants in or around your home, that’s worth taking seriously.
The other thing to look for is frass a sawdust-like material that carpenter ants push out of the galleries they excavate in wood. If you find small piles of what looks like coarse sawdust near baseboards, window frames, or in the basement, that’s a strong sign. Carpenter ants are a real concern in Laurelton specifically because the neighborhood’s older Tudor-style and Colonial homes have the kind of aging wood-frame construction these ants prefer particularly anywhere moisture has gotten in over the years. If you’re seeing large ants and finding frass, don’t wait on it. Carpenter ants cause structural damage over time, and the longer the colony is established, the more work they’ve done.
Yes when it’s done by a licensed operator using regulated materials. In New York State, pest control technicians are required to hold a valid NYS Department of Environmental Conservation Pesticide Applicator Certification to legally apply treatment in a home. That certification isn’t just a piece of paper it means the technician has been trained in where to apply materials, how much to use, and how to do it in a way that’s effective without creating unnecessary exposure.
We use only NYS DEC-registered pesticide materials on every job. The difference between what we apply and what you buy off the shelf at a store on Merrick Boulevard isn’t just potency it’s precision. Professional-grade treatment is applied in targeted areas, at appropriate concentrations, by someone who knows exactly what they’re doing. That’s a meaningful distinction for a household with children and pets, and it’s one of the main reasons professional ant control is genuinely safer than repeated DIY attempts with aerosol sprays.
The three species that show up most frequently in Laurelton homes are pavement ants, odorous house ants, and carpenter ants. Pavement ants are the small dark ants you’ll typically find pushing up through cracks in driveways, sidewalks, and foundation lines they’re extremely common in older residential neighborhoods like this one. Odorous house ants are the ones that trail through kitchens and bathrooms, usually in search of food and water, and they give off a distinct smell when crushed.
Carpenter ants are the most serious of the three. Laurelton’s position at the Queens-Nassau County border gives it a more suburban character than most of the borough, with mature trees, established landscaping, and older wood-frame homes all of which create favorable conditions for carpenter ant colonies. These ants don’t eat wood, but they hollow it out to nest, and in a home that’s 60 to 90 years old with any moisture history, they can find plenty of places to get established. If you’re seeing large black ants, especially near windows, in the basement, or along exterior wood trim, carpenter ants should be your first suspicion.
There’s no honest one-size answer to this. For a straightforward pavement ant infestation with a single accessible colony, the initial cleanout can resolve things relatively quickly with one or two follow-up visits to confirm activity has stopped. For a more established infestation particularly one involving carpenter ants nested inside the structure, or multiple satellite colonies spread across a property it takes longer.
In Laurelton’s single-family homes, the latter scenario is more common than people expect. Older homes with mature landscaping, basements, and wood-frame construction often have infestations that are more deeply established by the time a homeowner calls. We build a follow-up schedule after the initial cleanout weekly, every other week, or monthly depending on the severity and keep returning until the problem is fully resolved. That commitment to seeing it through is what separates a real ant control service from a company that does one visit and moves on.
Yes we offer a 10% senior discount, and it applies to ant control services in Laurelton. When you call to schedule your free estimate, just mention it and it will be applied to your service.
Laurelton has a large population of long-term homeowners who have lived on the same blocks for decades and maintained their homes through every season. These are the residents who know their houses best and who are often the first to notice when something’s changed, whether that’s a new ant trail in the kitchen or frass showing up near a basement beam. The senior discount is our way of acknowledging that relationship between a homeowner and their property, and making professional ant control more accessible for the people who’ve invested the most in keeping these neighborhoods what they are. If you’re not sure whether you qualify, just ask when you call we answer 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
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