A sweet tooth & ants

Question
Hi Janell , I guess you could call this an unusual question. My rat, Mona, she's about 1 1/2 -2 years old who has partical freerange of my house and a large (tall) ferrat cage, has probably the biggest sweet tooth i've seen for a rodent before. It's not that she eats them though, she just wants to take it and store it, like packrat mentalaliy would I guess lol.  My problem though is the ants that find it and follow, I live in california where it's mostly always dry so ants are mostly a problem I find when you have pets here. I know just not giving her sweets of any kind would stop the ants..but she'd be pretty upset and I think that would be the last resort if I can't find some way to make the ants keep away. I don't think i can use any pesticides since I have other animals ( fish and cats) plus she runs around so I was wondering if you knew of any...natural repellent for them?
Thanks a lot for any help !

Answer
Honestly, I don't know of anything you can use around the cage/in the cage. I know of plenty of things to use outside the cage in the house itself (on windowsills, sidewalks, and doorjambs) to keep the ants from even making it into the house -- but it's the usual Raid and Hot-Shot approach.

I feel you on the ant/CA thing.. we live in Bonita, southern CA, and they're just MISERABLE here. My biggest pet peeve ever! I hate ants!