eelgrass
Long Time Member
- Messages
- 31,710
A complete and utter failure!
I've been taking care of my parents lawn for a couple years. About a year ago, what I thought was gophers took up residence in their back yard. I tried a few traps but drew a blank. I kind of forgot about them over the winter. Then, in February when I started mowing in ernest, I decide to get serious. I set my traps and got some gopher poison and baited the runways without traps. Everytime I went over to their house the traps would be empty and a bunch of fresh mounds show up. I kept setting traps and placing poison grain in every fresh dig. Nothing!
Then one evening I was there digging out for a trap and noticed some fresh dirt moving over in the corner of the yard! I grabbed the shovel and quietly sneaked over and in one quick scoop got the little bugger! Much to my surprise it wasn't a gopher at all. It was a MOLE!
No wonder I couldn't bait them. Moles don't eat grain. They eat grubs and worms. OK! At least now I know the enemy!
I got on the internet and looked up how to kill moles. Mole traps work best but only IF the runway is visible above ground. My moles are deep diggers which is why I thought they were gophers in the first place. I can't find a place to set the traps and the prongs aren't long enough to reach them if I could find a runway. I tried flooding them out (which very seldom works but is cheap and you might get lucky). I tried smoke bombs with the same result. I tried soaking the lawn with some bug killer thinking if you take away his food, he will have to go somewhere else. So far that hasn't worked.
I found some poison artificial worms (very expensive) and that gave me an idea! I dug into a mound and found three runways comming into it. I then dug down deeper and placed a coffee can level with the bottom of the runways, and back filled to the top of the can. Then I put a box of night crawlers from the bait shop in the can and covered the whole thing with a board. I figured a mole would come by, smell the worms and drop into the can. Once he's in there he couldn't jump out. Got him! I left it undisturbed for three days. I went back today only to find 6 new mounds all around my worm trap. I lifted the board and nothing! The worms were happy and safe and undisturbed.
I give up. I can't do it anymore. I'll just rake all the mounds and mow big clouds of dust into the air. I can't do it any more!
I'm a failure. My mom doesn't even come out and offer me lemonade any more. My self esteem is so low I may not even buy a deer tag this year. If I can't out smart a mole how can I kill a cagey blacktail?
Eel
I've been taking care of my parents lawn for a couple years. About a year ago, what I thought was gophers took up residence in their back yard. I tried a few traps but drew a blank. I kind of forgot about them over the winter. Then, in February when I started mowing in ernest, I decide to get serious. I set my traps and got some gopher poison and baited the runways without traps. Everytime I went over to their house the traps would be empty and a bunch of fresh mounds show up. I kept setting traps and placing poison grain in every fresh dig. Nothing!
Then one evening I was there digging out for a trap and noticed some fresh dirt moving over in the corner of the yard! I grabbed the shovel and quietly sneaked over and in one quick scoop got the little bugger! Much to my surprise it wasn't a gopher at all. It was a MOLE!
No wonder I couldn't bait them. Moles don't eat grain. They eat grubs and worms. OK! At least now I know the enemy!
I got on the internet and looked up how to kill moles. Mole traps work best but only IF the runway is visible above ground. My moles are deep diggers which is why I thought they were gophers in the first place. I can't find a place to set the traps and the prongs aren't long enough to reach them if I could find a runway. I tried flooding them out (which very seldom works but is cheap and you might get lucky). I tried smoke bombs with the same result. I tried soaking the lawn with some bug killer thinking if you take away his food, he will have to go somewhere else. So far that hasn't worked.
I found some poison artificial worms (very expensive) and that gave me an idea! I dug into a mound and found three runways comming into it. I then dug down deeper and placed a coffee can level with the bottom of the runways, and back filled to the top of the can. Then I put a box of night crawlers from the bait shop in the can and covered the whole thing with a board. I figured a mole would come by, smell the worms and drop into the can. Once he's in there he couldn't jump out. Got him! I left it undisturbed for three days. I went back today only to find 6 new mounds all around my worm trap. I lifted the board and nothing! The worms were happy and safe and undisturbed.
I give up. I can't do it anymore. I'll just rake all the mounds and mow big clouds of dust into the air. I can't do it any more!
I'm a failure. My mom doesn't even come out and offer me lemonade any more. My self esteem is so low I may not even buy a deer tag this year. If I can't out smart a mole how can I kill a cagey blacktail?
Eel
I want to get rid of the moles but I would like my mom to be able to use the yard too!
