Re: Varmint's
- To: M*@ucdavis.edu
- Subject: Re: Varmint's
- From: R* F* D*
- Date: Thu, 31 Aug 2000 10:20:57 -0400 (EDT)
Linda wrote:
> I am plagued with gophers and moles Do you have a remedy to get
> rid of them?
I also use wire cloth (galvanized to reduce corrosion). However, in contact
with soil, the zinc oxide-hydroxide-carbonate coating will be likely to
break up faster because of the preesence of humic acids present from
decaying plant matter. It helps if the soil is slightly alkaline.
To slow down this corrosion and increase the efficiency if the cloth, I
first lay down some crushed rock. This has to be of a size that critters
can't pull through the wire cloth holes. Then I lay down the wire cloth,
then another layer of crushed rock. The finished rock-wire cloth sandwich
is about 3-4 inches thick, depending in the gauge of the wire cloth holes;
it is about 4 diameters of wire holes wide. There are several advantages to
this approach.
As sections break, burrowers will have a hard time finding the weak spots,
and a lot more work finding purchase to whack away at the wire. The rock
should slow corrosion of the wire. The layer can also act as a French drain.
I have moles and pine voles, and have a hard time with bulbs and tuberous or
rhizomatous plants, like Salvia guaranitica. For small critteers, working
in a barrier of crushed rock in the soil works well, since voles are weak
diggers, and opportunistically use mole tunnels. Moles search for
earthworms and beetle grubs, and won't dig into rocky soil if there is
easier hunting elsewhere.
Plants with thickened underground parts normally grow in difficult
environments like caliche, sandrock ( a southeastern US term for a fine
clay-sand mixture), and in cracks in rocks where they are not attacked by
burrowers. We get into trouble when we drop them into our loose, fertile
garden soils without their natural protection.
Richard F. Dufresne
313 Spur Road
Greensboro, North Carolina 27406 USA
336-674-3105
