Moles

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Common name:               Mole

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Latin name:                        Talpa europaea

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Description

Black velvety fur covers a cylindrical body, 12 to 16cm long, with short hairy tail. Adults weigh 70 to 110 grams. Large spade-like front feet adapted for digging.

Lifestyle: Moles are distributed widely in permanent grassland and deciduous forest, however they tend to avoid shallow stony or waterlogged soil. They are solitary creatures living almost entirely underground where they dig for worms and form an underground tunnel system covering potentially hundreds of square meters. They build a nest underground of dry grass in which to have a litter of young.

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Impact of moles

To form their tunnel systems, moles push the excavated soil up to the surface where they create the familiar molehill. They will readily dig up well-manicured lawns and damage flower beds or allotments, burrowing under plants damaging root systems.

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In agriculture the inclusion of soil from mole hills in silage grass can result in spoilt silage and is a source of the disease Listeriosis in sheep.

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Treatment

i-Pest will conduct a survey to confirm the presence of moles and the extent of the burrow system. Traps can then be set to capture the moles and halt their activity.

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