Say Goodbye To Moles In Your Yard For Good With An Effective DIY Solution

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Moles. You don't see them, they don't eat your plants, but their tunnels will surely announce their presence. Apart from being highly unattractive, tunnels dug by moles cause structural damage to your yard, and create pathways for other pests to access the roots of your vegetables and flowers. Thankfully, there is an effective DIY solution that will help you say goodbye to moles in your yard for good.

Trapping is by far the most effective way to get rid of moles. While it might be a last resort for gardeners favoring more natural approaches, such as flowers and herbs that can help keep moles out of your garden, isolating, killing, and physically removing moles are the only guarantees of ending their presence in your yard. The benefit of using traps as well is that you do not need to hire a professional to use them. Most traps are affordable and readily available for purchase online or at home improvement stores and garden centers.

To set a mole trap, locate and access an active tunnel. Next, compress the dirt in a section of the tunnel, straddle it with the trap, and set the triggering mechanism. Once a mole reaches the compacted area, it will begin to dig through the dirt and set the trap. It's important to check the trap regularly to see if it has worked. Keep using the trap until you go at least 48 hours with no catches. More often than not, though, you will have near immediate success because moles will travel their own tunnels with relative frequency.

We'll be going over three main types of mole traps that provide the most effectiveness for your money: harpoon, scissor, and tunnel. The harpoon trap, such as the Victor Plunger Style Mole Trap, is by far the easiest to set and use. It can be set over a mole tunnel, have its plunger pulled back and set, and then left for a mole to come across. When triggered, it will instantly release its spears to kill the animal. 

The scissor trap is equally easy to set up and also incredibly effective. Certain scissor traps like the Polaflex Galvanized Steel Scissor Mole Trap only require you press the trigger with your foot once it has been placed over the tunnel. Instead of harpoons, the scissor trap uses spring-loaded jaws to snap onto the mole, killing it instantly.

Finally, there are tunnel traps. These essentially mimic the conditions of a tunnel, tricking the mole to venture inside. On most tunnel traps, there is a flattening mechanism triggered by the entering mole. Other kinds of traps are what are known as catch-and-release traps, in which the mole is simply locked inside to await removal. Regardless of your preferences, it's clear that trapping moles is far more effective than using other methods that don't actually deter moles. For instance, coffee grounds are a kitchen staple believed to repel moles from gardens, but they really don't work.