How to get the blind man out of the garden and save the harvest
Mole rats belong to the order of rodents that eat all the root crops in the backyard. Therefore, the question of how to get the blind man out of the garden sooner or later arises among many owners of private farmsteads or summer cottages.
How to recognize a mole rat
The rodent got its name because of the anatomical features of the eyes: in their place there are folds of skin covered with bristly hairs. The ears and tail are undeveloped, and the forelegs are small. The lips are covered with folds that protect the mouth from dirt.
A distinctive feature of a mole rat is 2 large incisors, which are menacingly exposed outward.
Unlike moles, which eat insects and larvae, the harm from a mole rat to the harvest is enormous, in its hole you can find tens of kilograms of vegetables and root crops.
It is difficult to catch a mole rat, since it constantly lives underground, without crawling to the surface. Builds multi-tiered burrows over 3 meters deep, the total length of which can reach 400 meters.
Narrow passages with a diameter of 6-12 cm are made for foraging and moving to the lower tiers. They find it by the piles of earth, which the mole rat pushes out when digging a hole.
It is better to catch the rodent in the spring, when it is hungry, and before setting the roots.
Blind rats and fighting them
Various traps, traps and crossbows are usually used. You can purchase them from the store or make your own. If a decision is made to make a trap for a mole rat, the drawing must be found on the Internet, choosing from a variety of proposed options.
Before setting the trap, you need to find a hole in fresh piles of earth. Hunting dogs are excellent at locating the pest.
To install a trap you need:
- slightly dig a hole;
- find the main passage, clear it to an earthen plug;
- remove the plug, set a trap in this place, about 5 cm from the beginning of the move;
- bring the trap chain out;
- cover on top with a piece of metal, plywood or roofing material, sprinkle with earth.
Fresh air begins to flow into the hole through this place, but the blind man cannot stand drafts. Therefore, he must return to seal the hole and fall into a trap. This usually happens within 30-40 minutes.
You can insert deep vessels with water into the dug hole. After getting there, the rodent dies.
How to get a blind man out of the garden using hooks
Instead of a trap, you can install a hook in this place or several hooks to which the loop is tied. Hooks are dug in near the exit from the burrow. The blind rat comes to fill the hole and gets on the hook.
This method of rodent control is rather laborious and not always effective. Success is determined by the correct location of the rodent, which is usually quite problematic. In addition, the mole rat is a cunning animal, only a young and inexperienced animal gets into the trap.
After catching one rodent, it is almost impossible to find others: they begin to show increased caution. But usually the blind are solitary animals, so sometimes after catching one of them, the crop can be saved.
What is a mole rat afraid of
Mole rats avoid noise and vibration: due to the absence of eyes, their other senses are especially sensitive.
Homemade scarers
Therefore, to create noise and discomfort, they use:
- iron bars with metal cans put on them;
- wooden pegs with impellers;
- glass or plastic bottles;
- battery-operated electronic scarer.
On the site, iron rods up to 1 m high are vertically dug into the ground in different places. Iron cans of juice or beer are put on top of them. When exposed to the wind, they create a constant noise, which the rodent perceives as a danger signal.
You can drive wooden pegs into the ground, put on impellers from children's toys on them. When the blades start spinning under the influence of the wind, a constant hum is formed. It penetrates underground, creating discomfort for mole rats and moles. Tin cans can be installed on the same pegs.
How to get a blind man out of the garden using bottles? Large empty bottles, preferably from champagne, are driven into the ground at an angle. The neck of the bottle remains 4-5 cm above the ground.
This technique becomes especially effective if we take into account the direction of the wind in this area. If you correctly catch the direction of the wind, then the noise effect occurs more often, which contributes to the rapid elimination of the pest.
You can make various "noisemakers" yourself. For this, the plastic bottle is cut and bent in a special way, a wire is passed through it. The end of the wire is buried in the ground, and a metal ball is placed inside the bottle. When the wind gusts, the ball creates noise that scares away the pest.
If a blind man is wound up in the garden, the methods of struggle must be chosen so as to maximize the safety of those around him, and so that after catching the animal, you do not have to look for ways to kill him. For this, noise methods are most convenient, since after a while the pest leaves the garden by itself.
Fight with ultrasound
Ultrasonic scarers have shown high efficiency. This method is aimed at the rodent's high auditory sensitivity.
The waves are transmitted through the soil, so the device is inserted into the ground and not into the burrow. The frequency range is 35-65 kHz. Manufacturers claim that low-frequency vibrations are not captured by human hearing, provided that the person is not at a close distance (closer than 0.5 meters) from the device.
Therefore, to avoid discomfort and headaches, close contact with the repeller should be avoided. The radius of propagation of oscillations varies from several tens to several thousand meters.
If the site has uneven terrain, various structures, wells and basements, it is better to use several devices. From purchase to complete disposal of the pest, it can take up to 1.5 months.
How to get a blind man out of the garden with water
In order to catch a rodent, it is recommended to pour water inside the hole. It will take a lot, given the size of the underground dwellings. It is the mole rat's nest that needs to be flooded. Therefore, first you should find a passage where lumps of clay are thrown out together with the soil. Clay is located in the deep layers of the earth, so the chance that a rodent is here is quite high.
The hole is cleared, the entrance to the hole is opened, and the hose begins to water. The disadvantage of this method is the need to kill the caught animal, which not everyone can do.
Another way of using water is very labor intensive. Around the circumference of the site, they dig a trench 30 cm deep. The edges are reinforced with slate or metal sheets, so that after getting inside the animal cannot get out.
Inside the trench, at a certain distance from each other, holes are dug, which are filled with water. Once in a trench, the mole rat moves along it, falls into one of the holes and drowns.
This method is good because you do not need to look for a mole rat's habitat, although you have to spend a lot of time and effort digging a trench.
What else is the blind man afraid of?
You can purchase a special poison to destroy the pest. Even rat repellents work. But they must be handled carefully so as not to harm pets and children. Even if the poison does not come into contact with vegetables in the garden, it is still dangerous.
There is an abundance of food in the garden, so the probability that the rodent will choose the bait with poison is extremely small.
Besides:
- Some gardeners fall asleep in their burrows with fetid waste, pour kerosene, and other odorous substances. But their effectiveness is extremely low.
- The blind man cannot stand the smell of parsnips. Therefore, it is recommended to plant it around the perimeter of the entire site and in several rows in the center. Choose long-rooted varieties so that when moving underground, the mole rat will bump into them.
- Some gardeners along the perimeter of the site dig into the ground to a depth of 0.5 meters metal mesh, which is considered an effective method to keep the pest out of the site.
Tar is considered an effective folk remedy (you can buy it at the store). It is diluted with water (30 ml per bucket of water), wooden sticks are soaked in a solution and placed in places where mole rats are spread. They cannot stand the smell of tar and go away. This treatment is enough for the season. It will have to be repeated next year.
If there are blind people on the site, then you need to take care of the safety of the crop in advance. Processing or catching must be carried out in late spring-early summer, otherwise the pest will eat or drag most of the root crops into its hole. The same methods are used as for eliminating moles. The struggle is not always successful, so it is recommended to apply several methods.