Why are moles in my yard? Two reasons: 1. They're just passing through (straight, isolated tunnels running up the drive, walkway, base of house, etc). 2. Because the soil is attracting them in (zig-zagging, wide-spread tunnels or mounds). This is often worsened by 3 things: - Poor moisture control.
- Use of pesticides in the soil.
- Decaying tree root systems (whether the tree's still there or not).
Is there anything that I might be doing to make my mole infestation worse? Yes.
- Moles love it when you water too frequently or never at all.
- Moles love it when you cut down trees or have decaying roots.
- Moles also like it when you use pesticides, like grub killer.
Are there things about my lawn that may make it harder to get rid of moles? Yes. - Large properties can be hard for moles to find distant exits.
- Also, larger lots are harder to practice good soil moisture control, which is important. Soil that's prone to over drying or has their irrigation heads that are poorly set to a thin stream of water, actually do more harm than good.
- Dead tree roots are deep and wide magnets for neighborhood moles. Trapping these isn't usually effective, these areas should be treated.
- Never watering a lawn. Allowing lawns to dry out in long St. Louis weather can drastically throw off the food balance of your soil. Be sure that you water your lawn regularly (2-3 times per week).
- Over watering a lawn. This too can create a lure for moles when the soil rarely has a chance to adequately dry out.
- The use of pesticides. Once these toxins metabolize, they can create a biological imbalance that often leads to mole infestation. Don't use pesticides.
What makes mole removal such a challenge? Moles are attracted to food. So, something in your lawn create an unnatural level of mole food that's pulling local moles in. Causes can be:
- Dead Tree Root System: Not the trunk, but the roots. Stump removal doesn't matter at all. The roots run as deep and wide as the old tree canopy and they'll be there for years. Decaying roots are strong mole magnets that go down further than traps can reach. However, our treatment will often drive them down far enough, you may not see mole damage or, eventually, out completely.
- Soil staying too wet or over drying: Both of these create an over population of mole food. Too wet means lots of worms, while it also kills the balance of bugs, which will backfire on you later. And drying the soil kills most insects until, that is, it rains. Then bugs swoop in to lay eggs in this once vacant lawn and over populating it with larvae...which is bad.
- Pesticides, or Grub Ex: Much like over drying, this sterilizes the soil and, once these toxins break down and are gone, it leaves bug vacant soil that where new bugs can lay too many eggs.
What if I only have a long straight tunnel cutting through my property to get to a mole mess in my neighbor's yard? - This means moles are just passing through to get to your neighbor's "mole magnet" soil. If you kill this mole but their soil remains alluring to local moles, then your problem might not end. It's best if they, not you, have us come out and treat. Then, your problem often goes away.
Is there a simple way to know whether to do mole trapping or our mole treatment? Yes. - If your mole infestation is straight, along the drive or walkway, there's nothing widespread indicating that your soil is luring moles in from the neighborhood. Then mole trapping is best for you.
- If your infestation are wide spread mole tunnels or mole mounds, this means your soil is drawing moles in. Without us treating the problem, the infestation will likely persist.
Is mole trapping ever best for mole removal? Yes.
- Long straight tunnels, trap them and you're likely done.
| What do we do to help with St. Louis Lawn Moles?
- We're the ONLY ONE'S who apply a spray treatment to the lawn and beds of a St. Louis property to help drive lawn moles out and keep them out long term. Everyone else is an exterminator which doesn't help with widespread tunnels or mole mounds.
Why is running irrigation during service important?
- Our treatment is sprayed to the surface of your lawn and must be watered into the ground to begin the process of helping to drive your lawn moles out.
What can I expect following a successful treatment? - Sometimes moles will just go away within a few days. We love that.
- However, usually mole evacuation takes more patience. "Mole Magnet" soil that cause your infestation is often very deep and create a strong "Pull" for local moles. Our treatment is applied to the surface and often require several rains to wash it sometimes 4' to 6' deep. Then, once out treatment reaches that "mole magnet" level deep in the soil, moles will often react. It can take patience.
Why a successfully treated lawn sometimes look worse before it looks better?
- Once moles detect our treatment in the soil, you'll often see their behavior changing.
- Moles will often either try to go deeper, trying to outrun our seeping soil, which often means more mounds being pushed up as they go deeper and way form our treatment. This is ugly but is actually a good sign that moles are responding.
- Moles may often move to new locations, trying to find untreated soil.
- Moles will often edge along the street, drive, base of the house, etc trying to find the property exits.
- Sometimes moles will just B-Line it out, but it's usually not that easy. And when they do leave that fast, they normally go through cycles of returning, leaving, returning, ect until they're eventually gone.
- As frustrating as this can be to wait out, all of this is actually an indication that moles are responding to our treatment, which is what you want.
- Solving difficult infestation isn't like calling a plumber. Treatment is the only thing that helps persistent activity, but it's not 100%, and it often looks worse before it looks better. That's just what it takes and it's often the only thing that helps.
Why is there an added fee if I don't have an automatic irrigation system?
- Our mole removal treatment has to be watered into the ground. An in- ground irrigation system simply runs for a few minutes per zone as we apply our treatment. If you don't have automatic irrigation, our tech will bring irrigation equipment and use your outside faucets.
Does your treatment kill moles?
- No. Our treatment is safe for kids, plants, pets and even moles.
Is it effective to treat small areas of my lawn?
- It can be. However, when we treat the ground, we're trying to drive the moles from treated areas to untreated areas. If you only treat part of your property, we can't prevent moles from moving to the untreated area of your lawn.
Can anything that I do help with the evacuation process? Yes.
- Practice good moisture control.
- Avoid pesticides.
- And you can add trapping, for an all-out assault on your moles.
Is mole removal from any service provider guaranteed? No.
- Nobody in the mole removal industry can ever guarantee that they'll solve your mole problem.
- The only guarantees that exist in this industry are that if your moles return, the service provider will continue to charge you to keep trying.
- That's why it's important to know what type of mole activity you have and when to trap and when to treat. If you try to hire us to treat 1 or 2 long, straight tunnels, we'll tell you "NO it won't help you". If you try to exterminate (trap or poison) widespread activity (zigzagging tunnels or mounds), killing them won't help you. It's really that cut and dry.
What happens if I treat, where do my moles go?
- Moles are wild animals that simply reside in your neighborhood. You don't own them.
- Like shewing birds from a tree, you can tell them to leave, but you can't tell them where to go.
- However, making your property less attractive to moles won't make your neighbor's property suddenly more attractive. In fact, usually a neighbor has moles because your lot is pulling them in.
What if mole infestation continues? - If you're trapping, and moles continue even after multiple catches, then you likely have a "mole magnet" soil problem that needs for us to treat it.
- If you had us treat the property and mole infestation continues, then retreating immediately won't do anything to help the effectiveness of the original application. Usually, since it can take several rains to wash our treatment down the 3' - 6' that it often takes to help, it can seem like the treatment isn't helping, until eventually it does. But, put simply, if you've tried extermination and our treatment doesn't help, then unfortunately there's no 3rd option. Sometimes moles can't be defeated.
If I don't know if I have just a few straighter tunnels or if my yard is decimated by mole activity, will you come out and check? Yes. However, as the only company who handles widespread "mole magnet" activity, we serve 9 counties. That's 7,200 sq miles. With our larger volume and service area, we simply can't just go check everyone's infestation. As a result, we welcome people to send pics for our review or to simply look at their mole activity to see if it's just 1 or 2 straight tunnels (trap it and your done) or if it's a mess of mole activity, in which case you'll need to have us treat. But, if you need for us to come and tell you which one you have, we're happy to do that. However, all visits are fee based.
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