Mole problems

[Breezesbenefactor]

Any ideas? Since they banned smoke bombs, I've tried traps with limited success since it involves excavating my garden, diesel on rags, thumpers, creosote on rags (which is the best of a bad bunch). Even shot at them when watching for their mounds to appear - can't use poison but if anyone knows an old wivies tale I'd love to hear it.

 

[rema]

Here ya go!!.

Over the years gardeners have tried a multitude of techniques to rid their prized lawns of these cute but destructive little creatures, including poisoning with smokes and killing with barbaric traps. However, if you have a small to medium size lawn there is a way to get rid of moles without the need to kill or capture them.


Moles have a highly developed sense of smell, so a more humane deterrent involves simply placing a few drops of a pungent essential oil such as Eucalyptus or Peppermint on cotton wool balls and placing these in the mole runs. The moles will keep clear of the strong smell and if you place as many balls as possible, they should decide to move away to a new patch - such as your neighbours!

Cover the cotton balls with a leaf before replacing the soil over the top

 

[Breezesbenefactor]

Excellent I'll try that one, thanks

 

[spaniel]

Get the licensed moleman in. You need strycnine worms (although Im not sure they are supposed to be able to buy it anymore).

As soon as horses start to walkk on moley ground you will find they start popping up again so it pays to get in someone who can properly identify which are your nursery mounds and which are active mole runs. He will bait the relevant ones and you may be lucky and only need one visit. Take a look at neighbouring land before you start as theres little point doing your own moles if they are migrating from next door!

 

[k9h]

Use to have a Corgi that would go "moleing"! She would stick her nose down the relavent hole & then trench it till she got to the mole!! Neighbour at the farm had a lovely lawn & was manic about his garden often saw him banging his shovel on the lawn (as they say vibrations keep moles away)? After watching him one day do this we snook over that night after carefully scooping up a mole hill on a shovel & placed it in the centre of his price lawn. The reaction when he came out in the morning (total youtube material!) Unfortunately that was about 15 yrs ago!!
Sorry not been much help!

 

[cheeryplatypus]

i read you are supposed to put a big stick down one of their holes and then put something that will rattle on the top (like a glass jar) as they dont like the vibrations.
never tried it as not much of a problem up here, cute moleys.

ps my gran used to get the gardener to hit them with a spade when they came up, but involves much waiting around and poor moley!

 

[suestowford]

I have caught a few moles in the past, using the 'snapper' type mole traps. These need to be placed along an active run so you need to squash down any runs you can see, wait for them to repair the ones they are using, then set the traps in the run. I tend to put a trap at each end of the run, if they get past one they won't avoid the second.

Another method which we have used (although it is time consuming) is to watch until you can see the mole pushing through under the surface. You then jump hard on the ground behind where the mole is. This stuns the mole, it suddenly has no space behind it and can't dig out quickly enough. You then get your spade and dig it out. The big disadvantage is that you have to spend a lot of time watching for mole activity.

 

[flyingfeet]

We put a little bit of diesel into the holes and they soon disappear. Again very pungent and probably not environmentally friendly