Voles take a toll on Fairbanks gardens, lawns
Published Sunday, June 7, 2009
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FAIRBANKS — Munching moose usually are the predator that green thumbs in Fairbanks have to contend with, but this summer it’s voracious voles that are taking a bite out of lawns, flower beds and vegetable gardens around town.
Landscaper Curtis Tindall, who owns Lady Bug Lawn Care, has been having problems with voles killing the lawns of some of his commercial clients.
“They’re like little beavers, chewing through everything,” Tindall said. “I was mowing the other day, and I literally saw three of them just run right in front of me and down in holes.”
Judging by the number of phone calls the University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service has received about voles, integrated pest management technician Diane Claassen said it appears to be a high vole year in Fairbanks.
“I’ve had probably five times as many calls this spring as last spring at this time,” she said. “I started getting calls as soon as the snow started melting.”
First, it was dead lawns criss-crossed with vole tunnels and runways, the result of the rodents burrowing under the ground to eat grass roots during the winter.
Then it was perennial flower beds, Claassen said. Gardeners noticed plants like dahlias and lilies weren’t growing back because voles had eaten the bulbs during the winter.
Greenhouses were next. Voles were munching on plants inside because it was still too cold to plant them outside.
“Voles were clipping them off in the pots at ground level,” Claassen said.
Now, with plants in the ground, the rascally rodents have moved on to vegetable gardens.
“I get at least three calls a day,” Claassen said. “I’ve had more calls this year than I’ve had in the five years I’ve been here.”
Michele Hebert, Claassen’s colleague at the cooperative extension service, said voles are “kind of running rampant” this summer.
“I hate to say it’s the highest year we’ve had, but it’s pretty crazy,” she said. “Just looking outside the window of my office, I can see one trail that’s about 50 feet long. They’ve built this little trench that leads to the flower bed, and when it gets to the flower bed there’s a hole where they burrowed underneath.
“They ate all the lilies out. They ate all the dahlia bulbs,” she said.
Hebert said she’s having similar problems in her gardens at home.
“I have these holes all around my house,” she said.
Travis Booms, the non-game biologist at the Alaska Department of Fish and Game in Fairbanks, said he’s heard mixed reviews about the vole population this year. Some biologists say they are seeing lots of voles and others say they haven’t seen many.
“I have no information to indicate it’s an irruption year,” Booms said.
One reason there could be more voles this year is because there was more snow this past winter.
“Deep snow always helps voles,” Booms said.
In addition to providing more insulation, deeper snow also protects voles against predators like owls and foxes, which have a harder time finding the rodents.
Tindall went on the Internet to research different trapping methods and has set up traps on lawns that have been damaged by voles. He put mousetraps at the entrances of holes, in vole trails and covered them with staked-down pieces of plastic rain gutter to guide them into the traps.
Mousetraps set up around vole holes and in vole trails “are probably the best way to go” when it comes to trapping voles, Claassen said.
In high vole years like this one, Claassen recommends trapping voles throughout the summer to reduce the chance of vole damage to lawns this winter.
“When it’s a high year like this, that means they’re healthy and they have a good food source,” she said. “They can have three or four litters a year, and they don’t hibernate. They can have three or four babies in a litter, so each female could have 15 or 16 babies a year. They can even have litters in the winter.”
Claassen also advises using plastic cups to protect plants like broccoli, brussels sprouts, cauliflower and cabbage from marauding voles.
“You cut the bottom out and just slide the cup over the top of the plant,” she said.
The cups protect the plants from voles and their white insides act as miniature greenhouses that reflect sunlight onto the plant and holds moisture in.
“Leave them on there as long as you can, and then cut down the side of them to take them off,” she said.
Be sure to use plastic cups, though, Claassen said.
“They’ll eat through paper or Styrofoam,” she said.
Contact staff writer Tim Mowry at 459-7587.
Community Discussion
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My dog eats them, too. Well, kills them, anyway. I think she plays with them more than she actually eats them.
Voles killed nearly 100% of our vegetable starts in the greenhouse. Only one cabbage plant survived, out of several dozen plant starts! Grrrrr..... I saw a fox the other evening sniffing around the base of our greenhouse, and was hoping that it would find a way to snag that pesky vole!
I had one in my shed in my backyard in downtown Island Homes. My son found it and it seemed unafraid. He fed it some grass by hand which it took and scurried off. I'm thinking it's spill over from the 2005 fire areas which make good vole habitat. Should be good Martin trapping soon.
Guess our springer spaniel is doing his job. Haven't seen any problems in our greenhouse.
Using poisons last year is probably the most likely reason that all our owls died this year. With no owls, there is no control for voles.
Opsamk, our neighbor killed a dozen foxes this year. I think that is one reason why we have so many voles in our yards now. We also have no Great Horned Owls or Boreal Owls this year, unlike previous years when they hooted and trilled and carried on from just before Xmas. There sure are ripple effects when humans mess with Ma Nature, eh?
wanna get rid of voles? get a couple of cats. they'll do the trick
robir8..."it seemed unafraid." Watch out for teularemia (sp?)!!! Never, never touch a wild animal that appears tame, disoriented or lethargic. Never!
Yup, the voles are out in force this year. My one outdoor cat has been bringing me breakfast. Yuck. But no vole damage this year. In years past, the voles didn't cause near the damage my dogs did digging up the gardens trying to get to the voles.
Please don't use poison, folks. Anything else that happens upon the dead rodent will also injest the poison via the rodent. All the methods described in this article work.
Also, get your pets de-wormed in the fall, especially tapeworms. The cat eats the vole who's infected, gets infected himself, then the dog gets into the cat poo and gets infected, too.
Happy gardening, looks like it's going to be a great season.
MrsS
They are real bad at the fairgrounds this year.The fair is getting some cats to put into action!
MrsSaenz raises some good points. While tularemia usually doesn't cause the lack of normal reactions some are describing and tends to be most common in hares and rabbits, nonetheless there are a variety of diseases and, more to the point, parasites they can carry and convey. Letting your dogs and cats work on the vole population is a good way to introduce all sorts of interesting parasites into their systems.
When I had my cabin there was a vole that somehow found its way up onto my window ledge above the sink. I could have killed it, I guess, but instead I put out a little pile of black sunflower seeds and a small container of water. For the next year or two (voles don't live much beyond 2 years) I was entertained by the company of the little guy/gal. Never tried to pet it or such but just watched it. My dogs would hear it now and then as it made its way up to the seeds but couldn't get to it, so it was safe there, too.
Glow....why is your neighbor killing foxes? The most they would do is take any stray cats and, frankly, having had a bird feeder for many years anything that would do away with loose cats was welcome around my place. Too, there was a fox used to visit my cabin for about 3 years. It would sleep on the front porch sometimes and I enjoyed its company immensely for it was a gorgeous and clever little thing. After it appeared, my neighbor's cat learned quickly to stay home. *Grin*
Oh...quick addendum....
I've noticed that at times voles can be surprisingly unafraid of a person. This seems to happen most often when they are at a population peak. I don't know if they just lose their natural fear or maybe they are totally petrified and therefore seem unafraid but it does seem to happen often. I never found it associated with disease and if put back down on the ground it would quickly recover its senses and scurry off.
Given just about everything in the world seems bent on killing them, I kinda have a soft spot for voles in case you didn't notice. *Grin* (Foxes, too.) (Dobermans.) (Pit bulls.) (Wolves, moose, caribou, owls, spiders, snakes, lizards, scorpions.) (Just about everything but Republicans. Ick!)
There are voles around my house too..we have to have traps in the crawlspace so they don't get in the water. My cat killed one the other day..
Sure, get a cat if you want a cat, will get it spayed/neutered and immunized and are prepared to take care of it come winter. Cats are great, I live with a few myself. But don't let your cat roam the neighborhood, dig in your neighbors' garden, kill songbirds and cause accidents running in the street. Yes this is a big vole year--we had a big vole year a few years ago too--learn to live with natural cycles--it's pretty easy to put a plastic cup over sprouts--instead of dousing the environment with pesticides and cruelly killing voles in traps--there are humane traps--multi-use deals. You then release the voles away from homes.
I -HATE- voles!!!!
Years ago we had a family of owls out back; GREAT vole killers, and easier to handle being around our kids than a fox, too. Though rare, fox can carry rabies.
Owls are cool to listen to at night, too.
I used to have a cat nearly a decade ago too. Sylvester was almost 18 years old when he went to where ever cats go when they pass on. I don't want another cat.
Poisons have the capacity to affect other species, even if they're alleged to be a poison with a brief half-life.
That leaves live-traps, water buckets filled with water (incorporating the ol' revolving 'bridge' technique, with raisins glued to the foot-bridge, of course), and ye old standard-issue spring-wire-type mouse trap, with small bits of peanut butter and oatmeal stuck to the trigger.
Most of those require routine maintenance and clearing/cleaning, though the water-filled bucket trap provides for a greater sense of retribution.
This year's vole harvest will mostly be conducted with traditional style mouse traps, peanut butter, and oatmeal. As a species-centric individual, I've never seen any real purpose for the relocation programs associated with live traps, whether for voles or squirrels; both of which are thieves of the highest order..
So, with 30 mouse traps, some BAD peanut butter and decent oatmeal, we step forth to reclaim our garden turf.
DIE VOLES!! DIE!!!
Victor traps work great. You really don't even need to bait them if you have them set in a high traffic area.
Not an expert on everything, teeball. Sometimes an expert on those things that I've personally dealt with, worked at or been trained in.
Taking on voles professionally would probably be even more frustrating, (or at least -as- frustrating) as working as a clinician was.
Both typically involve insurmountable odds, repetetive behaviors that cause unending troubles, and critters with questionable IQs.
That said, I guess that I'll just continue to comment on those subjects that I either know something about, or have some experience with.
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tbear44,
What's a 'Victor Trap'? Are they a traditional mouse trap?
By the way, teeball, I've only commented in two topics today, that I know of; voles and health care issues. Yes, I know varying amounts about both of them. No, I still have no desire to be a 'vole-ologist.'
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Frankly, the last three or four years at our place have seen significant vole populations in the garden, barn, compost, etc. It serves as a motivator when I till the garden and other areas with the Troybilt. I smile broadly as I envision tilling up their tunnels and dens with what must seem to them like a 'mechanized earth-quake meets shredding device.' Vengeance is mine...
I have a couple great mousers, they usually bring home babies to. The onlt gross thing is that they bring them home, and the dogs eat them. Gross.
At least we still have voles. No poison please.
Does anyone know why there are so few owls this year? Many of our neighbors have commented to me about not hearing or seeing as many owls this year as in the past.
I don't know if they are fewer owls over-all or not, Glow. As I wrote earlier, I used to have a few of them out back, and would hear them regularly. The voles weren't as great in number back then, either.
Then we went several years without hearing many owls; certainly not the number we'd had earl;ier. I've figured that they probably rotate through their chow areas as needed, from place to place, but I don't know that.. And while they were gone, we had enough voles to make a respectable blanket out of..
This year at least a couple of them seem to be back 'in the hood,' hooting fairly often in the evenings. Hopefully they're munching down heavily on the little potato and carrot-eating rodents.
I know from arctic biology studies years ago that at least some owls have more eggs on years when there are greater numbers of voles in their feeding/living area. If that's the case, then we should be seeing lots of owls in the near future, assuming that there aren't other factors affecting their populations.
Should've been "I don't know if there are fewer owls or not," -not, "if they are fewer owls or not.." Oooops..
We have a vole in our house who keeps getting into my chocolate. At least, that's what my wife says whenever I tell her that some of my chocolate is missing.
"Must be a vole, dear."
There were a couple articles in the DNM recently on the numerous deaths of Boreal Owls in the Fairbanks area. If I remember correctly it was determined they had starved to death rather than suffered from a disease. They were unable to find sufficient voles and other rodents to feed on due to heavy snow cover last winter.
Story on the owl deaths......http://www.newsminer.com/news/2009/may/21/dead-boreal-owls-were-starving-not-sickly/
You should try mowing your lawns really close to the ground. Keep up with your mowing too. Maybe hanging a few pieces of meat in trees would bring in raptors or ravens too. They'll predate voles, especially when you've mowed down the vole's cover.
My dog eats voles like candy.
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