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Voles can be very damaging to a lawn and yard. They love to chew the vulnerable stems of young trees and woody ornamental plants, causing severe damage and dieback. Voles also cause considerable turf damage, which most homeowners discover in the spring.
What attracts voles to your yard?
Meadows, weeds, dense, heavy vegetative covers in your yard attract voles as they serve as an area to breed and protect them. Excess brush and mulch on your lawn. Woodpiles and corners around trees, shrubs, and gardens can serve as hiding areas for them.
How do you get rid of voles in your yard?
Voles can be removed humanely from a yard by using live traps, or they can be exterminated with mouse traps or bait traps (which use poisons). They can also be deterred by fencing and driven away with vole repellents.
What does vole yard damage look like?
If it’s voles, you’ll see patches of gnaw marks with irregular patterns about 1/16th to 1/8th inches wide. Gnawed stems may have a pointed tip, and the roots or tubers may also show the same wear. But voles don’t need snow for cover, explains the University of Maryland Extension.
Do voles cause problems?
Voles commonly live in gardens, where their vegetarian diet can cause problems for gardeners. For most of the year their numbers tend to remain low. However, in autumn they can build up high populations and cause a great deal of damage into early winter.
Do voles damage lawns?
Voles can cause damage to small trees and shrubs. They can have multiple litters in a year, and every 3 to 5 years there is a population boom. Lawn damage is most visible in the spring. Prevent and manage vole damage through yard sanitation, reseeding grass, tree guards, trapping and pesticide application.
Do voles leave after winter?
Voles, like many other mammals, stay active all winter long, but their strategy is markedly different than most others. Instead of hoarding food in secret caches or hibernating after bulking up, this rodent goes on a diet – and adjusts from a solitary being to a communal one.
How many voles live in a hole?
There may be two adults, several juveniles, and a nest with up to 5 babies in a family colony. Adults are thought to defend their home habitat or territory from invasion by other voles.
Do voles come in the house?
Voles generally like to stay outside. Voles prefer eating plant materials and generally don’t do well indoors. As such, they rarely enter the house. When they do enter your house, you have several options for getting rid of them.
Do coffee grounds repel voles?
Although it is a debated subject, coffee grounds do appear to repel voles in the lawn. Sprinkle some around vole holes in the lawn, and watch for any results.
Do voles come back every year?
Active year round, voles multiply rapidly, producing up to 100 offspring annually. With adequate shelter and a plentiful food supply, a colony will thrive. So your first move is to eliminate environments that make voles feel at home: excess brush and mulch, leaf piles, wood stacks, and tall grasses.
Does grass grow back after voles?
Voles can also damage trees and shrubs. When food sources are scarce, they’ll eat the bark around the bottoms of trees and shrubs. Unlike gophers, voles only eat the blades and stems of your grass, and not the roots or crown. So, the grass should grow back as the weather gets warmer.
Do voles dig holes in lawns?
Vole burrows, which look like holes in the lawn or around the bases of trees. Spaces where the grass of the lawn is suddenly very short. Noticeable gnaw marks on the stems of woody plants and young trees.
Do voles tunnel?
Voles typically tunnel on the surface creating two-inch wide runways with golf-ball-sized entry holes. Their surface tunnels are usually most noticeable in early spring.
Do voles eat mice?
Voles are small rodents that grow to 8–23 cm (3–9 in), depending on the species. Voles thrive on small plants yet, like shrews, they will eat dead animals and, like mice and rats, they can live on almost any nut or fruit.
Can voles damage your foundation?
After the winter thaw, many a homeowner has discovered extensive vole damage around their foundation plantings. Fact: Voles aren’t particularly difficult to kill; however, state and local regulations often stipulate what they’ll allow because of environmental regulations.
Do voles go away in the spring?
Snakes, hawks, owls and other predators help control the population. While highly visible in early spring, vole damage to lawns is usually minor. Little can be done in the spring to eradicate voles. As the snow recedes, voles leave the now-exposed turfgrass and seek cover in areas with taller vegetation.
How deep are vole tunnels?
Vole tunnels have openings 1.5 to 2 inches across and are typically hidden beneath mulch, shrubs, or spreading plants. Look for fresh grass clippings or seeds near tunnel entrances. Spongy soil. Some voles burrow and create many shallow tunnels, while other types dig down to a depth of 12 inches.
How do you fix vole tunnels?
Homeowners just need to take a few easy steps. Rake the debris and excrement from the runways to promote growth. Fill pathways with topsoil. Fertilize and overseed areas that do not recover. Prune and fertilize trees and shrubs that have been chewed by voles.
