OT MoleVille!

[John Kuthe]

I have pet Moles! I keep them outside, in my backyard!

I rarely see them.

John Kuthe, Climate Anarchist and Keeper Of The Moles!

[itsjoannotjoann]

They can certainly wreck your yard. There was one in my yard about 3 years ago. Yard looked terrible and that was my first ever time having one or ever seeing their trails.

[Cindy Hamilton]

We trap them or poison them if they're close to the house; otherwise we ignore them. I derive particular satisfaction from flattening their hills and runs with the lawn tractor tires.

I'd rather have moles than kill all the grubs (a preferred food of theirs) in the lawn with insecticide.

The soil in my yard is heavy clay and they like to run just under the thin layer of topsoil. In sandy areas moles often stay deep enough to be unnoticeable.

Cindy Hamilton

[Bruce]

Do you also like to pull out the wings of flies?

[Cindy Hamilton]

Would you prefer I nuke my yard with carbaryl or trichlorfon?

Cindy Hamilton

[Patrick Dennis]

If you're still living in the 60's and 70's why not use Chlordane and Oftanol too?

Another tuff day at work posting to Usenet all day, eh?

[invalid unparseable]

I see zinc phosphide baits still allowed. These worked great for me. Has to be forty years ago and not a mole since.

[Patrick Dennis]

Yes, some swear by those baits while others say that trapping is the best approach.

Eliminating most of the grubs from your turfgrass seems to help, as they're a favorite food source for moles.

Neonicotinoids have replaced most of the Organophosphates now as mostly a prevention, such as Merit or Grub-X.

These controls are IPM, they only target specific pests, and have no apparent effect on earth worms.

There are concerns about Neonicotinoid use and bee kill though, especially in the liquid form, so they may not be available much longer.

You can have 5 grubs per square foot under your lawn and never really notice, until the skunks and raccoons find them and shred your turf chowing down on them.

I've always called grubs 'land shrimp'.

[invalid unparseable]

Reading about current use the phosphide baits release phosphine gas in the rodents stomach which kills it. I wonder if the stuff I used released gas into the tunnels to kill them all. It is nasty stuff and could have been toned down.