Darn voles!

[katoguy]

I was hit hard (worse than hard) two years ago. I raked up the dead grass and put down a black dirt/seed/fertilizer mix. It came back great.

I put out some poison and didn't have a problem last spring.

Well, the snow has melted... you guessed it. Darn little varmints had a good winter eating my sod/roots. Arghhhh.

Any pointers and getting rid of them for good? (I live in a 5-yr old subdivision that used to be a farm field.)

Thanks. If anyone wants to see horror-story pics of what voles can do I'll email you pics from spring of '06.

[hoggs222]

I'm not sure. My parents are on a newer golf course in Albertville and they've got voles. My mom just drowns them when she finds them.

[daydreamer]

I've tried several things the past couple of years including urine powder, traps, drowning, and red pepper flakes.

The thing that I think worked the best because I could see it working was oversized mouse traps (rat traps) with peanut butter as bait. I would set them along their travel routes (along house and/or under a bucket)and I would bet I caught 10-12 of them last summer. They breed like rabbits so you have stay on top of them.

I did sprinkle red pepper flakes all along the sides of the house and where they enter the grass out by my shed in the fall hoping they would leave. Most of the snow was gone from my yard and instead of having trails all over like I did last spring I probably had an 5'x5' area of my yard tore up but that beats the trails in my opinion. It should be a lot easier to re-seed that.

[katoguy]

I kept kill stations all summer and they are back this spring.

I killed 7 of the little varmints last night just by trudging around in the last bank of snow. I'd eventually scare one out, and then BAM.

The lots on our street are narrow at 65 feet. They infiltrated my yard, but didn't touch my neighbors' (who, BTW, don't even maintain their yards well).

[crowhunter14]

I've also combatted the little suckers the last two springs since we moved in. When and how do you treat for these? I'm assuming before snowfall? I haven't heard any ideas to treat for them and am usually left to fill in their tunnels and reseed every year. Any suggestions would be great.