Voles/Moles a heavy burden

We've had a family cottage in central Wisconsin for 50 years. For the first 40 years we didn't have any problems with moles, voles, or gophers. About 10 years ago the moles and voles decided it was time to move into the area. We along with all the neighbors have now have serious problems. They destroy the plantings and the lawns.

We've tried traps, sonic repellants, and a variety of chemical repellants. We don't want to use poisons because of the neighborhood cats, dogs, and foxes. About the only way we can keep them down is by rolling the lawn every couple weeks or so with a 700 lb. roller behind the garden tractor. That seems to discourage them, but never fully gets rid of them. This year we had a mild winter, so the ground keeps freezing and thawing. They have been burrowing through the soft dirt all winter. Hopefully we can catch up with them as the weather warms enough to turn on the outdoor water to fill the roller again.
 
Want to borrow a Rodenator. There is one at the farm. Using it in town may cause law enforcement to show up. I does work well with voles and gophers. It will take out the entire tunnel grass plants and all. The biggest down side it will set anything dry on fire. Traps will work, but are a pain to check and reset. In the orchard they don’t like where we flood irrigate. Still need to deliver the 2 1/4 steel bar to you. Found out it is tool steel and not 4140
 
Voles are a type of mice that live in burrows. They don't make mounds of dirt at the tunnel mouth. If you live in an area that has frost, walking around when it is frosty is a way to find the active holes. The frost at the mouth of active holes is melted because of the heat from the voles inside.

Moles are hunters that eat worms, insects, grubs and such. They dig two types of tunnels. The shallow ones that often hump up above the surface are "hunting" tunnels, which are where their food source lives. They also dig "deep" tunnels for travelling and refuge. The hunting tunnels are mostly for one-time use, and the deep tunnels are reused often. If you use traps, they should be placed in the deep tunnels. Moles leave round, almost hemispherical mounds of dirt that they remove when making their tunnels. If you trap or kill moles, other moles often move in, using the old deep tunnels.

Gophers are rodents that mostly eat roots. They push out dirt from the mouth of their tunnels in a way different from moles. The tunnel mouth is angled to the ground surface, and the expelled dirt it pushed out of the mouth to the side, instead of mounded straight up. The tunnel mouth is closed up with dirt when not in use, so an open hole with fresh dirt spread out from it is an indication that the gopher is active and nearby. I have a truck built for forest fire protection on our tree farm. It has a high volume, high pressure pump and a 2,000 gallon tank. When I find an active gopher hole, I bring the truck over, put the 1" fire hose in the hole and start pumping with the engine at idle. Pretty soon a soaking wet gopher pops up stunned and shaking. You can just walk up an dispatch them easily, because they are too disoriented to try to escape. A garden hose will not deliver enough water volume to accomplish this.

Some cats and dogs will hunt and kill moles. They seem to catch them in the hunting tunnels. The same goes for gophers. Cats seem to be better at this than dogs.
 
woodchucker said:
not in CA
Click to expand...
That's a shame. From what I understand, they are a mixture of wood dust, potassium nitrate, and sulfur. It is the sulfur dioxide that does the critters in.

We had had a recent mole explosion here and I will have to do something about it. I'm wondering if ammonia would also do the trick. Plug the entrances up and inject ammonia into the tunnels. Surely, CA can't object to that since it is a widely used source of nitrogen fertilizer by the agricultural industry.
 
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