A couple of weeks ago, I noticed that I’d got some molehills in my vegetable bed. Our garden backs on to some fields and, in the past, we’ve had moles at the border between our garden and the fields and (occasionally) coming down the hedge between us and our next door neighbour. However, this is the first time they’ve come this far down the garden.
I was surprised because there had been no sign of moles coming down the garden (normally I would have expected to see molehills coming down from fields), the first sign was just a hill in the middle of the vegetable bed (could it have walked across the lawn in the evening?)
It trundled around inside the raised bed for a while, kicking up the odd pile of soil but not doing any damage. As the beds have nothing in them at the moment, I wasn’t bothered until it went underneath the strawberry plants, raising piles of soil between the plants. At that point I went in and banged about a bit to try and discourage it. I’ve been mildly successful and the mole has moved off across the lawn. Its hit the concrete path beside the house and is working its way along the edge. What I’d like to do is to encourage it to work harder so that its away from the garden before spring.
The picture shows how far its travelled so far, I first noticed it in the vegetable bed (the raised bit in front of the mesh tunnel & greenhouses and over the last couple of days its been working along the edge of the path. In about another 20 feet or so, it will reach the hedge between ourselves and our neighbours when it can either carry on or turn left to go up along the hedgeline.
The video was taken from inside and shows the mole working its way just under the surface. I must admit I stood on the bit of tunnel it had created to try and discourage it from going further into the grass (I won’t call it lawn as this implies a higher quality).
My question is what can (or should) I do about it. My father had a piece of wood on a stick which he used to bash at the holes to discourage the moles (I think it did more to make him think he was doing something rather than actually discouraging the moles) and I’ve emptied a waterbutt of water into the tunnels which has probably done as much good.
My assumption is that the mole will probably go away when spring comes and there’s more activity in the garden but I’d rather it didn’t make a mess of the ground over the winter.