Ants in my Plants!

Idly looking at the GH from some distance away, I noticed that one of the canes appeared to be moving. Thought I was imagining it but went in to investigate. 
The cane was covered in winged ants that were crawling up from the compost which was teeming with lots of wingless ants. 
The roof of the GH was speckled with the winged ones.
I uprooted the worst affected plant, in its bottomless pot and carried it outside. The ants were crawling on my arms and dropping off the GH roof into my hair. It was like something out of a horror film.
Not sure where they are now but the nest was treated to some ant powder. Sorry Ants but you're not having any more of my plants if I can help it!

Oh no! Do ants do a lot of damage to plants?

https://gardening.which.co.uk/hc/en-gb/a...the-garden

You'll have to decided for yourself as, having read the "which" article, I'm not sure!!
I had a nest in a bag of new compost earlier this year and I couldn't use it for seeds as the ants and eggs were right through it. I scooped up as many eggs as I could and put them in a bucket of water. The rest of the compost went into a wheelbarrow and I stirred it up every time I passed to disturb the ants and expose the eggs to the sunlight. The ant activity stopped but I'm still not happy about using the compost.

It also seems that all the flying ants start their flying off at the same (ish) time. Tell me this, do they all have the same clock or calendar to synchronize their emergence?