We recently moved to a fairly rural address. Today we had a lot of snow melt. I took these pictures of some "trails" in the snow that appeared as it melted, and also some damage to the lawn in some areas. It appears to be sort of burrowing/tunneling activity. Does anyone know what causes this? Mice? Voles? Something else?
This first image shows the snow trails.
Thanks,
Claire
Picture 2 - funny angle. There is a rock retaining wall and you can see some trails leading out from it. I thought they were runoff from water, but wait till you see the next pic.
third pic - a larger section of lawn that is all tunneled and torn up from whatever it is. I wonder if the grass will just grow back and it's just a winter problem. If the grass grows back, I don't care about the critter. The lawn looks a bit devastated though.
Last pic for now - this kind of shows the major bad area plus the "trail" as it leads off to the side. I am pretty sure it is a critter and probably the same one that left the snow trails. Looks like a small rodent of some sort. I love small rodents (have had hamsters, rats, mice etc. as pets) so I'm not disturbed by it and I don't want to kill it. I want to learn to live with it but would like to know what it is and how to prevent the lawn damage if possible.
Thanks,
Claire
Not pests at all. Probably a mouse or a vole. Snow has great insulating values for these little critters. They tunnel around under snow and since we had a decent amount of snow this year, it's considerably more obvious what they were doing under the snow cover. The upper layers of snow reflect the suns rays and help stop the snow from melting close to the ground where the tunnels are. The outer air temps could be -15 and those tunnels are going to stay very close to 32 because of the earth's radiant heat. Once our snow melts down to where yours is, I'm sure our entire yard will be a labyrinth. Back when the snow wasn't as deep as it is by us now, I watched some sort of a hawk try to land in the snow with talons ready. They know that supper is down there. I don't think the hawk I saw diving into the snow was successful. It's definitely not uncommon to see coyotes leaping up then furiously digging down into the snow to try to get at the networks of tunnels that the little critters are digging. Sometimes they are successful, sometimes they aren't.
I wouldn't worry about your lawn. It doesn't look torn up to me but I can definitely see where the tunnels were. This happens to us every year we get decent snow fall. I've never seen any areas that didn't fill back in with no help from me at all. Please consider not spending any money trying to fix something that I think may very well right itself on its own. Give it just a few weeks after your lawn resumes active growth and see if there's any evidence that the tunnels even existed by then.
I suppose if you wanted to discourage the mice and voles somewhat, you could rake up the grass cuttings and compost them or something. We leave ours specifically so the little critters can have a field day under the snow. It is not infrequent that we find tunnels that have been lined with the grass we left. Our kids love to look at the "evidence" that there was life under the snow. Great photos. The first is the best.
Thanks Equilibrium! I found some websites showing vole activity and I think that's what it is, as you suggest. Most of the lawn seems fine - just has the paths showing at this time, which I don't mind. That front section does look a bit more hard-hit. Elsewhere still has hints of green in the grass, whereas the front area does not. Up close, it looks like all the grass was uprooted really. Sort of looks like it might have been a vole "city" for a while. I am happy to have them under my snow and hopefully eating grubs or other things in my lawn. I'm not a really big fan of "lawn" anyway. I plan to turn a lot of this property into "prairie grassland" kind of areas, and then a small orchard and perennial bed areas. But, the front lawn will stay to an extent, to project the "good neighbor" image although I haven't got many neighbors out here, which suits me fine!
I won't spend any money on it unless I see that the front area is just completely not coming back, and then I might dig it up properly and turn it into a new bed. I read that voles will eat flower bulbs but are not fond of daffodil bulbs, so maybe I'll put some of those in, along with some aromatic perennials to deter the deer.
Thanks for your response!
Claire
I've got all kinds of bulbs here and I know I've got both voles and mice. Seems as if the only critter that really does damage would be the squirrels and I finally figured out a way to foil them so plant what ever bulbs you want.
What's your secret method? I am sure we will have squirrels here too...
You wanna know my secret, eh?
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Chicken wire. I kid you not. I got fed up when a squirrel tried to take off with an entire bag of bulbs I was trying to plant. There he was, trying to drag the whole bag off backwards while my back was turned. I got the bag but I realized it wasn't over yet as they were probably out there organizing to plot revenge.
It's simple. I drill my holes using a bulb auger (I use one similar to the one listed over in Garden Products) then I plant my bulbs one by one using golf tees to mark where I planted each bulb. I leave enough area to add another inch or so of top soil and another inch or so for mulch. I cut the chicken wire to the shape of the bed and tack it down using the same stakes we use for tying down tents. The golf tees show up through the chicken wire so if you've planted a bulb that won't come up easily right through the chicken wire, a few snips takes care of that. After that, I remove the golf tees and add top soil and mulch and that's it. The squirrels get very few, if any, of my bulbs these days and I leave the burrows of shrews and moles alone so they can take care of underground pests.
Here's a link to an auger that's real similar to the one I use-
http://davesgarden.com/products/gp/
It's under bulb auger.
Ah! An excellent plan indeed! I am planning on installing some chicken wire at the base of the yet-to-be-built fenced area (my greyhound needs a fenced area). I was going to make it into an L shape and put the one side up against the fence and the other along the ground, slightly buried, because apparently that will stop the rabbits from entering as easily. I like rabbits but my greyhound likes them in a whole different way, which does not work well for me! Better to let him have his area and they have their area outside of his.
I shall experiment with the chicken wire in my bulb areas. I have a lot of landscaping to do and I think that will work for any number of areas.
Thanks for the great tip!
