Moles.................

I have had a tremendous problem with moles.  They have devastated my garden (so far my precious tomatoes have survived the onslaught) destroying my pea patch, my lettuces, and are working hard on everything else.  The green beans and the cucumbers are doing OK, so far, as I planted them along the fence and inside open-ended gallon tin cans.  I think the only reason they are making it is because Mr. Mole doesn't have a clear path in which to burrow and those cans are confusing him.  Maybe. 
Anywho, I called our local county agricultural agent and asked him a few questions.  Do those little windmills that you place in the ground and vibrate when the wind blows keep moles away?  In a word, no.  He also said that trying to drown them by placing a hose down the tunnels doesn't work either.  My idea of hooking up a hose to my car's exhaust and gassing them with carbon monoxide brought a chuckle from him, and he said nothing really works except trapping them.  Yuck. He said moles make extensive tunnels over a 1/4 acre area and are capable of digging 60 -80 feet an hour.  Holy cats! No wonder water and gas don't have much of a success rate.  His suggestion was a trap called ---- are you ready for this? ---------- the moleinator. Such a cheesy name, but he said it works very well.

No one here locally carried them so I was forced to shop online  (oh darn) and found one on Amazon.  The trick to capturing the mole, I am told, is finding a newly made tunnel, stamping it down, then setting the trap over the ruined tunnel.  When Mr. Mole comes back through checking his network of tunnels, he comes to the ruined tunnel and begins to re-open it. As he burrows through the collapsed tunnel and into the center of the trap, SNAAAAP! He meets his maker.  So this week will be the testing of the Moleinator.  I shall keep you posted.  Thanks for stopping by Two Dogs.  Have a fabulous week.

Good morning!  Thanks for stopping by.  Grab a cup of coffee and let's talk moles and planting your garden. Last year I had a tremendous problem with moles. They could be gophers, but I think they are moles. They made unsightly holes in every part of my property and when they invaded the vegetable garden, I lost a lot of plants. Not sure if they were eating the roots or if they just tunneled beneath the plant and broke the roots off. In any case I wanted this problem to be at a minimum this year, so another experiment I am trying involves using one gallon tin cans that I get from the local pizza parlor. I remove the bottoms with a can opener which gives me a solid ring of metal about 10 inches in depth, give or take; I have not measured the cans. I work a little fertilizer into the soil, push the tin can ring into the ground, and then plant the seedling (or larger plant) inside this ring. My thoughts are that this will prevent Mr. Mole from destroying the plant's roots right near the base of the plant and may possibly keep the plant from dying. It will also save on water while the plant is small because I can water just inside the can knowing all water will go directly to the roots. I know my Charlie dog will get a lot of the little demons, but in case he misses a few..........I will keep you posted on how this works as spring and summer progresses.

UPDATE ON THE DOUBLE COVER GARDEN PROJECT:  (Ignore if you live in a warm, wonderful, garden -friendly area!! :-)     It worked!  The pepper plant that I planted, covered with a milk jug and then a Wall-o-Water survived temps in the low 20s, wind, 8 inches of heavy wet snow the first part of April, and several days with no sun.  This gives a jump of no less than TWO months head start on garden plantings as it is never safe to plant before Memorial Day here in Burney as we are never frost free until then ----- the weather may be nice for days on end and then one night we get slammed with freezing temps.  It takes only one night of a dip in the temperature to destroy a lot of hard work and dreams of a bountiful crop of veggies if you forget to cover the plants on that one particular night. Oh how we get lulled into a false sense of security by warm, sunny days.  
Thanks so much for stopping by!  Have a wonderful weekend.