I have had a mole in my vegetable garden for a long time.
Apart from ruining my pathways with random heaps being pushed up between the
broken apricot pips the mole started to eat my root vegetables.
My understanding was that moles eat grubs and earthworms so
it was quite a shock to pull up a wilting carrot and find 80% of the vegetable
eaten. After I harvested the last of the carrots I hoped that the mole would
leave but then I saw my leeks starting to wilt just to find they have been
eaten like the carrots.
I started to harbour murderous thoughts towards this unseen
visitor. I started researching how to get rid of moles in your garden. A friend
said her grandfather used to fill 2l plastic cooldrink bottles with water and
putting them upside down in the holes and that seem to drive them away. A
tempting idea but if I had to put a bottle in every hole my unseen visitor has
made it will look as if a couple of cooldrink crates fell over in my
vegetables.
Poison was out of the question because I have worked too
hard to keep my soil healthy to poison it with poisonous fumes spreading
through the tunnels into the roots of my vegetables.
A visit to my local garden centre introduced me to the Mole
Pole a sonic mole repeller. The Mole
Pole gets pushed into the soil and sends out sonic waves every 20 seconds with
four different frequencies. These sonic waves will annoy the mole and the mole
will move to the neighbouring gardens.
I had my doubts about the effectiveness of this device but
the humane and safe angle sold me on it. Needless to say I am now the proud
owner of a Mole Pole and somewhere in my garden is a mole getting annoyed to
the point of moving to other gardens.
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| The Mole Pole Planted and Hopefully Annoying the Mole |
There is a lot of positive feedback from users but there is
also some negative feedback, only time will tell in which category I will fall.
Congratulations on finding a humane approach. May the visitor soon return to his natural habitat.
ReplyDeleteGreat article Thys!
ReplyDeleteThe best mole controller I know of is a nice snake. I remember growing up my father was having an epic "Groundhog Day" like battle with a very active and destructive mole tearing up his perfectly manicured lawn. It was an ongoing war. Then one day the devastation stopped. What had happened?
My father discovered in a pile of tree limbs that he had pruned along with other garden trimmings, that a big powerful king snake (a non-poisonous variety) had decided to take up residence there. The snake had a huge bulge in his body indicating that Mr. Snake had in short order made a meal of my father's nemesis.
My mother, always the dry wit in the family, remarked how funny it was that paradise and peace had returned to our garden with the return of the serpent! Ha!
My father came to love that snake and always made certain that he had his wood pile in which to live and hibernate under during the cold winters of the mid-western United States where I grew up.
Cobras are great hunters of moles and vermin, however unfortunately for us they do pose dangers when in our gardens. Here in South Africa we are fortunate to have the mole snake. However it often can be mistaken for a cape cobra. Visit the Cape Snake Conservation website at www.capesnakeconservation.com for informative video on how to correctly identify these snakes. You may be one of those lucky gardeners to have a mole snake residing in your garden... the best mole control of all!!!
Thank you Susan, I like this story nature in harmony. Find out what eats the problem pest and introduce it into the garden to control it. I will have to research how to make my garden snake friendly.
DeleteJust found this on the internet "The mole snake can be "quite ferocious". Though not venomous, they can cause severe bite wounds. Despite this, they are said to make good pets when sufficiently settled." This might be my solution if the Mole Pole does not work I must get a Mole Snake. They are very beautiful, not sure if most of our visitors will be comfortable with a Pseudaspis cana in the garden.
ReplyDeleteHi Thys, Judy and I will be interested to know how successful your Mole Pole is as we are also tormented by a mole in our garden which has successfully evaded our three lazy cats so far.
ReplyDeleteHi Peter, I will keep you posted.
ReplyDeletedid it work?
ReplyDeleteYes Luke, I haven't had problems from moles in my vegetable garden since I introduced the mole pole.
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