Tuesday, 30 June 2009

Moles























My heart sank when I saw the latest eruption of mole hills. We had a particularly destructive one last year that excavated and undermined the main path. I vowed to remove it, only to find it dead during the bitterly frosty weather last winter, having crawled under a bucket lid to shelter. It must have been trapped on the surface, and unable to burrow into the solid, frozen ground.

Moles are a real nuisance in the vegetable garden. Compost heaps are attractive to them, being filled with lots of large, juicy earthworms, but they can mix a large quantity of sub soil into the the compost, rendering it unusable. I line the bottom of my heaps with woven ground cover matting.

They also undermine other structures (like paths), and also find the chicken run attractive as the manure run off probably increases the earthworm population. Unfortunately, their burrows attract rats which can then colonise the space.

Reluctantly, I think I'll have to relocate this one, using a humane trap. I will wait until ground conditions are better, I don't think it would be fair to release one while the ground is so hard.

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