What causes little red sand piles on my floor?

Ants? Carpenter ants? Termites?

Where do you live? It could be ants. Time for ant buttons.

Could be ants.
Do you also have lines of dirt on the walls or foundation of your home? Along the outside or interior, perhaps in your basement? Could be termite dirt.

definitely ants

You should call an exterminator, sounds like ants or termites and the over the counter stuff isn’t strong enough to kill them effectively…..

Ants…

Sounds like loose floorboards allowing air to come up, are they piles or trails along the cracks, some suggest ants or termites but I would first check for air drafts coming up

Little tiny beach going fairies? But probably ants or termites, neither of which is a very sweet image.

(Why hasn’t anyone mentioned ants?)

Welcome to Fluther.

No one mentioned little children, dirty shoes or dogs.

No one seems to have also considered that the “little piles of sand” could very well be “little piles of sawdust” ... from the ceiling. In older homes especially “powder post beetles” bore into ceiling beams and joists, leaving small piles of sawdust (a charitable way of saying “powder post beetle excrement”) on the floor underneath where the work is actually going on. It can be a severe problem – especially when you don’t know that you have them until you see the piles on the floor.

I’d suggest calling an exterminator to see if you have a bigger problem than you think. A good one will tell you exactly what you’re dealing with.

If they’re neat little pyramids like around an ant hole and not just random scatter, I don’t think they’re sand. Leave them undisturbed as evidence and call in the exterminator.

Why hasnt anyone brought up Aliens! there vaporizing people in your home! I saw the movie.