A vole nest of dried grass sits along the path they run on.

Now that the snow has melted and the ground is bare, it is easy to see where meadow voles have taken up residency. With teeth like a rabbit, a dark brown fir body and a tail like a rat, only a mother vole could want one. Although they are small, 5 to 8 inches long, they do a lot of damage. Unfortunately for gardeners, voles dine on tulips, crocus and other bulbs as well as the roots of trees and perennials. Digging tunnels through garden beds, they are the devil to dislodge.

We have found evidence of their tunnels in the perennial garden, by the pond and along the driveway among the groundcovers. One nest was woven in the liriope along one of their footpaths and another in the vegetable garden compost. The nests are made of dried plants and grasses.  One had a bit of string among the grasses.

I have been slow to recognize the problem. It is a new one for us. When I noticed last summer that my red jade tree was loosing leaves, I thought it might be drowning from all the rain. I did find a holes in the ground around its base but I assumed the squirrels had eaten more of my spring bulbs. Now it appears that my fifteen-year old tree is dead, along with the colonies of spring bulbs that bloomed underneath it. All perished so voles could feast. It’s the original underground party.

Thankfully voles are unprotected animals in New York State, probably because they reproduce readily. They can breed any time but the peak breeding time is spring. Females mature in 35 to 40 days and can have five to ten litters of three to six babies a year. You do the math. Just thinking about it wears me out. The only good news is they rarely live longer than a year.

We’re setting mousetraps at each tunnel opening even though the best time to capture them is in the fall when their population is highest.  We have captured three already, only two hundred more to go. For more information on how to trap them, check out the vole videos on youtube.

The entrance to a vole tunnel is a round hole in the ground.