Voles Digging Holes In Yard

A vole s burrow can be identified by holes found in lawns or around the base of trees.

Voles digging holes in yard.

Following surface runways often leads to a vole hole. Signs of voles in your garden may include runways on the surface of the ground on in your lawn. Voles may travel through mole tunnels but also dig their own burrows. Use the links above the graphic to find more information about many of the offenders and be sure to check out our problem wildlife page for more details on other wildlife conflicts around homes and farms.

Mole holes are covered by a hill of earth while a vole hole is not. The runways may be about one to two inches wide. The only visible evidence of a vole burrow is the neat exit holes an inch or two across. Vole holes may be even as small as a dime.

See our mole page. Evidence of a vole problem is easy to see but spotting these shy nocturnal pests is rare. Voles myodes are small stocky rodents similar to field mice. Voles look like mice.

In contrast moles are not rodents. Vole holes can be right out in the open or cleverly hidden under foliage or debris in the garden. Holes throughout the lawn are usually sourced to small rodents like voles or moles or insects. By mixing gravel into some of the dirt in your lawn voles will likely turn around and head toward softer soil that is more conducive to digging.

The grass immediately surrounding the hole will be very short. Moles are all nose and mouth. Pesky voles and shrews create small holes with openings of about 1 to 1 1 2 inches while squirrels and chipmunks leave behind 2 inch holes. Birds make holes in sod as they search for food and earthworms make small little holes the size of pencils to aerate the soil and provide air to their tunnels.

Even though these little critters only grow to be 5 7 inches long they can cause massive destruction to your yard and garden so figuring out how to deter voles is paramount. Voles have small rounded ears that are often hidden by their fur small eyes and short tails. Preventing vole lawn damage. Holes are another visible sign of vole activity.

The animals dig dime sized entrances to their burrows around the roots of plants. This guide helps diagnose what s digging tunneling feeding and otherwise disturbing turf grasses. In fact a vole might look like a mouse at first glance. Eliminate entryways even though you re more likely to see other rodents like mice and rats inside your home voles are the same size and just as likely to make their way there.