By Pat Dray
The Garden Spot
Pat Dray.
Most of us will at some time or other see “tunnels” in our lawns and blame the moles. While it’s true that moles tunnel, so do voles, and the voles are the ones that damage our gardens.
Although moles and voles are both about the same size, they have very different dietary needs. Moles do not eat roots and bulbs, but voles do. It’s easy enough to remember the difference by the first letter of their names: moles are meat eaters (carnivores) and voles are vegetarians. They are the culprits (along with mice) that eat your plant roots and bulbs.
Moles can actually be viewed as beneficial critters as long as you don’t mind the look of the tunnels. Moles will aerate your lawn and soil with their tunneling. They’ll also eat beetle grubs, snail larvae, insects and earthworms. They can eat as much as 70 to 80 percent of their body weight in a day. One study found a single mole can eat up to 175 grubs a day. The grubs that the moles love to eat are what actually cause the lawn damage and death that you see associated with the tunnels. Grubs eat organic matter, including the roots of grass.
So please don’t blame the moles for the dead patches of lawn.
What are grubs? They’re the fat, white, wormlike larvae of beetles that hatch in the warm weather. They have voracious appetites and love the roots of lawns, especially those that are in the sun and well-watered. You’ll notice brown patches in your lawn as the grass dies off, and you may even see patches that have been pulled up by skunks or raccoons, who also love to eat grubs.
Do not use poisons on these creatures. Moles and voles will ingest the poison, but any predator bird, such as a hawk or eagle, will then eat the poisoned mole or vole and become collateral damage. If you are looking for a quick solution, trapping with a Have a Heart trap baited with peanut butter followed by relocation is the quickest way to eliminate them. To control voles, don’t mulch deeply near trees and remove wood piles and yard debris where the voles live.
To eliminate moles, you need to eliminate the grubs that they feed on. First, remember that grubs are surface insects and eat roots near the surface. To encourage deep root growth for the lawn only do deep watering. If you have an automatic sprinkler system, don’t run it daily for short periods of time since that encourages superficial root growth. Water it once a week with about one inch of water. Applications of milky spore disease and/or beneficial nematodes will eventually kill the grubs. Beneficial nematodes are microscopic worms that attach to the grub and literally “suck the life out” of them, providing a quicker solution. Milky spore may take two to four years for the active organism, Bacillus popilliae, to completely inoculate the area treated, so is a longer-term solution.