I’m a tenant within a California based housed, but unfortunately, my roommate who handles communications with the landlord it out of town, so I’m not quite sure what our responsibilities are.
Anyway, I discovered that the kitchen (particularly around the sink) is being invaded by ants. There seems to be a few dozen at any given time. Are we on the hook for getting rid of them, or is that the landlord’s job?
What kind of ants are they?
do they look like this?
Nah, those aren’t big enough 
Seriously, they’re the tiny little black ones.
If they are large ants (slightly smaller than Rick’s example) then you are looking at carpenter ants. They are twice the size of regular ants. Sinks are often places of moisture and carpenter ants like this. They are distructive and the owner has a vested interest in taking care of it.
You’ll have to read your rental agreement to be sure, but usually pest control is the responsibility of the landlord. However, you might try some inexpensive ant baits before calling the landlord. At least you can say you’ve tried to fix the problem.
I have had the best luck getting rid of ants using the ant traps/baits where they go into the trap and take the poison back to the lair. It’s maybe $10 at the grocery store to get a supply. Also, if there is any food residue, especially sweets, make sure that is cleaned up thoroughly. At some point your landlord probably does have an obligation if the problem is chronic, but just because there are a lot of ants doesn’t necessarily mean it will be hard to get rid of them, IME. Ants around here bite and I react badly to those bites, so I take it seriously when they get in. It’s never required a professional. At most sometimes my husband gets drafted to apply serious poison outside when they build major encampments near our door.
When I lived in KS i rented a house I suffered an ant problem (the whole area did). I found a product called Ortho (If I remember correctly). Comes in a tiny bottle - you place a drop of liquid on the tear out squares, give it a couple of days and they’re gone.
That’s an effective option, but the liquid is sweet-tasting and if you have kids or pets, it may be a little risky. The plastic disks have something similar in them and it’s less dangerous if that’s an issue.
