Mole Control

Where to place a mole trap. Before trapping moles, it's important to figure out where to set mole traps. Mole tunnels can usually be located simply by looking at your yard. Since the runway must be active for a trap to be effective, locate a runway traveling between two mounds and step it down with your foot. If, within 24 hours, the mole has repaired the cave in, the runway is active. If a runway isn't visible from the surface, grab an unfurled metal clothes hanger and start probing the ground at 2" increments out from one of the mole mounds. Once you find one, follow it 10 to 15 feet away from the mound with your probe and step it down.

Kill yard moles with mole traps. There are harpoon traps, scissor traps, and choker traps, and they all work great. I wouldn't recommend any one type over another. Look for brands like Out O' Sight, Victor, or Nash. These traps are placed in or above the runway. When a mole runs over them or, in an attempt to repair their runway, pushes up on them, they find themselves quite dead. Use several traps throughout the yard, mark them with flags, and reset and move them if you go several days without killing a mole. If you do kill a mole or two, you may be done. They're pretty territorial. But, just in case, leave your traps set for another few days.

Trap moles with pit traps. Pit traps allow for relocation rather than mole extermination. First, locate mole runways (see above) and grab a large coffee can. Then grab a shovel and gently expose the tunnel. Next, using a small spade, dig a large enough hole in the floor of the tunnel so the top of the can will sit flush to the tunnel floor when placed inside the hole. Once it's in, clean any loose dirt off the tunnel floor so the mole won't detect any foul play. Finally, grab a large piece of plywood with which to cover the tunnel and the pit trap. If the mole sees any light, this trick won't work. Check your mole trap daily.

Kill moles with mole poison. If you're serious about getting rid of moles, get yourself some mole bait laced with mole killer. Perhaps the most commonly recommended of these is Talpirid Kills Moles Bait. Talpirid mole bait looks like worms and is laced with bromethalin. If you can't find Talpirid, use Motomco, they're nearly identical. Other mole baits to consider are Kaput and RCO Mole Patrol. Kaput uses the anticoagulant warfarin to kill moles. It comes as a gel and is injected into mole tunnels with a syringe. RCO Mole Patrol contains chlorophacinone and acts both as an anticoagulant and a metabolic inhibitor. It comes as a pellet and is inserted into mole runways through holes created with a probe.

Kill moles with gasses. One way to kill yard moles is with fumigant cartridges. Fumigant cartridges, when shoved down mole holes and dropped into tunnels, kill moles by releasing sulfur dioxide and carbon dioxide. Another option is aluminum phosphide. This stuff generally comes as a tablet or granule. When it's dropped into holes and tunnels, it reacts with the moisture in the ground to release phosphine. When the phosphine is released, the moles go bye-bye. Whatever you use for gassing, make sure to seal as many openings as possible so the gasses don't escape. Also make sure to read the directions. Depending on what state you live in, these may not be available for purchase.

Use a buried fence for mole pest control. Fences can be used as well as trenches for keeping moles out. Start by buying a bunch of fine mesh hardware cloth that is 3 feet tall. Next, roll it out and bend a 90° angle all along the bottom of the hardware cloth. The resulting ledge should be about 6 inches wide. Once that's done, bury your fence so that it reaches two feet below ground. This should leave 6 inches sticking up above the ground to keep garden moles from climbing over.

Keep moles out with a filled trench. To keep moles from entering gardens and yards from underground, dig a 12 to 18 inch wide by 2 feet deep trench around the perimeter of the area you want to protect. Once dug, fill the trench with gravel, crushed shells, clay, cement, rusty razor blades, sharks, liquid hot magma, or anything else that would be unpleasant or impossible for moles to dig through. Once filled, you can leave it as is or cover it with soil, rocks, blocks, etc. While this works quite well for keeping moles out, they do, on occasion, crawl over.