Fighting water voles in the garden properly

Water voles and other voles can damage plants. With the right mouse management, however, the garden can survive this fairly harmlessly, and the gardener does not get stressed, but remains calm and unimpressed - a garden life in peaceful coexistence with nature only requires control in exceptional cases and relies on many before that other ideas. Find out why, when and how which reactions promise which successes:

Fight water voles and Co. properly

If there are a few voles in your garden, regardless of whether they are water voles or field mice, it is highly recommended that you work towards peaceful coexistence with the small animals in your home garden. Why this is so, why they are usually not water voles and what you do in case of mass reproduction will also be discussed; This is first of all about fighting.
Peaceful coexistence does not mean "let the mice dance around you", you can do a lot to ensure that the voles in your garden "behave properly":
If you manage your garden as close to nature as possible, natural enemies of voles will appear as soon as voles are there. These include weasel species, especially the mouse weasel, foxes, polecats, martens, cats, owls and birds of prey. If the voles are already there, but the garden is not yet attractive enough for vole enemies, you can give them some support: For birds of prey Erect perches as a hide, offer weasels and co. Heaps of stones as shelter, in suitable outbuildings (barns etc.) entrance holes for owls create.

If voles are currently in your garden and you want to replant valuable crops, you can use the soil provided for this in late autumn Make vole-free by thorough soil cultivation and the voles by a few "forage plants" in the back of the garden on uncritical garden areas focus. This can be B. be a herb meadow with hardy herbs, from which you can take care of yourself, but which the voles can also eat / subvert.
Under these circumstances you should also choose spring as the planting date (instead of putting "tasty young trees" in front of the voles in autumn); In spring, the trees can be placed in a basket made of wire mesh (mesh size around 1.5 cm), which offers safe protection. Such wire baskets are available in various prefabricated sizes in stores. The wire must be carefully hooked onto the folded seams, after filling in the soil, it is bent against the trunk without fastening and covered with a layer of soil about 5 cm thick. You can also protect onions and tubers in a similar way, for which there are ready-made wire pots or baskets available in specialist shops.

Home remedies that make sense

Home remedies for water voles and other voles can make sense if they are used sensibly. Within a garden management that sees a garden as a piece of nature, by a gardener who is interested in what he is doing and why. Then many ideas can help you to "live with nature in the garden" stress-free, for example:
1. Anti-vole plants
You can grow plants such as garlic, imperial crowns or milkweed (elder, catnip, daffodils, thuja, juniper, onions ...) around garden areas that are worth protecting. But only makes sense if the voles have a habitat in another garden area or behind the garden fence.
Whereby living space behind the garden fence does not mean your neighbour's garden - you can of course spend your life with yourself To drive the voles to each other with the neighbors, but most people do not see such a purpose in life as very meaningful at.
Also, voles don't live in your vegetable patch to annoy you, but to survive. If garlic or the like is to drive them away from a desirable source of supply, that will only work if an evasion in Nearby areas are possible in which good sources of supply are also waiting (applies to all attempts to drive away or Lockout). Because whatever fragrance you try - it is "unbearable" for the animals, as is sometimes claimed the fragrances do not, "no one has died yet, but many have already frozen to death (starved)" also applies to Voles.
2. Lock out
Locking out is possible on smaller areas (e.g. B. a vegetable patch)

possible by installing barrier fences that the mice cannot undermine. You need wire mesh with a mesh size of about 1 cm and a height of 1 m, of which 50 cm are buried and 50 cm protrude from the ground. The top 10 cm of the wire mesh must be angled outwards, so the water voles and other burrows can no longer climb over the fence.
But only helps if the area is safely free of mice before fencing in, otherwise you will lock the mice in with the covered board ...
3. Broken glass as a vole wall
Also a popular suggestion: surround areas to be protected with a strip of broken glass scattered on the floor. Whether the edges of these shards of glass are even fine enough to hold such a small paw: www.abload.de/img/009jke69.jpg Doing anything, however, is questionable - besides, voles can break the glass infiltrate elegantly from below.
4. Raised bed
Makes sense as a vole protection and also helps to earlier harvest, because the soil in the raised bed is warmed through better. But only helps in connection with the 2nd, namely chain link fence under the raised bed, otherwise voles like to try their hand at extreme climbers ...
5. Ultrasound equipment
Ultrasound devices may also make a vole legs if they emit frequencies that are within the animals' hearing range. That alone will not be easy to fathom: rodents should hear between 20,000 and 60,000 Hz, whether this also applies exactly to the vole species active in your garden is uncertain; It is often not possible to find out exactly what frequency an ultrasound device emits.
In addition: The ultrasound devices transmit with a sound pressure of up to 140 decibels, which is far more than the noise of a jet fighter starting right next to your ear. Experiments with martens have shown that the ultrasound devices no longer work very quickly because the martens damage their hearing as a result of the devices got, and the ultrasound devices are also increasingly suspected of being responsible for human hearing damage / tinnitus en masse be. The human hearing range goes up to about 20,000 Hz, how the human body processes loud sounds in the areas above has not yet been conclusively researched.
6. Troublemaker
Rattle mills, wind turbines, singing bottles... have all proven to be ineffective, in the life of a "vole of today" there really is More exciting than colorful or rattling wind turbines (they are against most lawnmowers comparatively quiet).
7. Drive away by stink
You will read about all sorts of strong smelling substances that you pour or pour into the hallways can stuff, from hair of all sorts of animals to fish brine to butyric acid, garlic stock and Whey.
This method has some logical flaws:

1. Animal hair could be repulsive if it came from a vole enemy. But: repelling at two or three entrances is not enough, you have to "scent" the whole building system (and trust that stupid voles live with you who do not simply have new entrances dig).
2. What is recommended to ward off odors, except for the hair of enemies, may stink human noses, but it is not certain whether it also stinks vole noses.
3. The concepts of odor defense assume with typical human arrogance that voles do not develop any odor preferences, i.e. all flee from the same smells. In an animal that has at least as much smell as the dog (40 x more olfactory mucous membrane than humans, 10 x as many olfactory cells) rather unlikely ...
4. Butyric acid also perceives the comparatively underdeveloped human nose quite well. The simplest fatty acid, but for us one of the most disgusting smells in the world, between vomit and Rancid butter - the next garden party should not be planned until weeks after the vole attempts to drive away will.

In the vertebrate research group of the Julius Kühn Institute, Federal Research Institute for Cultivated Plants,

www.jki.bund.de/no_cache/de/startseite/institute/pflanzenschutz-gartenbau-und-forst/arbeitsgruppen/wirbeltierforschung.html, you can find out which smells most voles reject, a research project on the subject has been going on there since 2009.
8. Driving away by noise
Open bottles, knocking vibrators, noisy children: noise seems to bother voles less (as I said, some lawnmowers are louder), but with them You might be lucky children: when they run around, it could generate vibrations similar to the kick of grazing cattle, and this is said to have a disgusting effect on voles to have.
The one above at 7. The vertebrate research group mentioned above conducts research into this, and also into bioacoustic methods that drive water voles away with sounds of their own kind (a kind of "get off" in mice).

Water voles: Statistically a rather rare threat

Water voles, Arvicola terrestris, are voles and live with us in a land and a water variant (the The water variant is colloquially called "water rat", so it really exists as an animal and not only in the Outdoor pool). A home gardener's chance of dealing with water voles isn't huge: if anything, you have it in the Garden to do with the land form of the water vole, even if you have a pond, the water rats live in larger bodies of water.
Water voles live underground and dig tubular building systems that are inhabited by small-group families living on the territory. The young (3-5 litters with 3-6 young per year) only stay in the nest for a few weeks and then have to find their own territory. That does not overlap with the territories of other voles, water voles colonize their habitat in a much lower density of individuals than earth mice and field mice (a maximum of 100 vs. 2000 individuals per hectare). To the problem (resp. noticed) voles only become voles when their gradation cycle has just reached a peak. This gradation (mass increase -> overpopulation -> collapse of the population) happens in field mice every few years (mouse year), the Water vole has much longer gradation cycles; population increase usually leads to surplus water voles in neighboring areas migrate.
Therefore, not every root gnawed off is a sign of water vole infestation, not even in times when the water vole "has only just completed one round through the media". Water voles only eat roots from below; if you notice signs of feeding, other vole species were probably at work. It is therefore rather unlikely that it is of all things water voles if someone is "digging" in your garden (we will talk about combating the rare masses below). But there are enough other voles, and the facts and thoughts about harm, benefit, prevention of mass reproduction, etc. affect the entire subfamily of the rooters:

Voles: Classification according to harm and benefit

Not all voles are as reluctant to reproduce and "evolutionary talent" to create high population densities as the water vole. Of the more than 200 species of the vole subfamily from the Wühler family that have conquered Asia, Europe and North America, some are on the way with us. The following species in particular cause more trouble than water voles:
1. Field mice
Field mice, Microtus arvalis, give birth to up to 12 young after a gestation period of just under 3 weeks, and the next 2 weeks later In theory, a pair of field mice can give birth to 2000 offspring in one growing season set.
2. Earth mice
The second species of the genus field mouse that we have is the earth vole Microtus agrestis, but their litters have a maximum 8 young, and (in contrast to the field mice) there is no continuation of reproduction over the winter.
3. Muskrats
Muskrats, Ondatra zibethica, are the largest voles. They were introduced to us in the last century as fur animals from North America, have now grown wild in our country and are expanding further in Europe. The water-loving animals are particularly noticeable due to the undercutting of dams and river banks, but they can also mess around a garden pond.
You will only see all of the other voles living with us in exceptional cases. Bank voles are more likely to be found in the forest, graceful small rodents that cause little damage because their meals leave only very fine gnawing traces and larger, intact root stumps. The native small vole Pitymys subterraneus prefers to colonize damp meadows and, with 2-3 young per litter, is almost rare Vole group of lemmings capable of the most powerful mass reproduction starts the migration caused by overpopulation much further north of US.
Voles in normal population sizes can also get the roots of ornamental trees and vegetable crops gnaw, especially in winter, when a hyper-tidy garden doesn't give them any other nourishment offers. You can also take half of the freshly buried flower bulbs and loosen the lawn a little too thoroughly from below ...
But: voles are important in an intact ecosystem for several reasons:

• Basic food for numerous animal species
• Burrowing species aerate the soil
• Collection activity ensures distribution of seeds
• Distribution ensures diversity and healthy plant growth in the habitat
• Consumption of insects and insect larvae keeps insect populations in check
• Plant residues and windfalls are "cleaned up" by consumption and turned into soil

Anyone who has so many important tasks is one of the key species in our ecosystem and that is precisely why they have developed a very high rate of reproduction. Which has adapted to the needs of the environment until humans have intervened:

Unecological vole control increases the damage

Peaceful coexistence in combination with gentle mouse management not only brings you the most benefit as a gardener, it is also recommended so that you do not cause the damage yourself. This is also for several reasons:
The whole trouble with the voles did not start in the house and allotment gardens, where you always knew how to live with your mice (and a few "community cats against these mice). Rather, the reason for escalating vole populations lies in modern intensive agriculture, which is the appointed enemies of the Voles - foxes, weasels, owls, birds of prey - hardly leave any habitats, but virtually the pests with their monocultures offers paradisiacal conditions, both together (even outside the peaks of the gradation cycles) can lead to enormous mass increases Extent lead.
Now quickly poison on it, the continued existence of the species, which was just believed to be assured, is again so uncertain by this "catastrophe" that the surviving female voles already have theirs

Increase hormonally restricted childbearing ability in a flash to the stop - lots of voles, at very short intervals. In the agricultural sector it has already been noticed and researched that "simple chemical clubs" tend to aggravate the problem Research communities are involved in "mouse management" and complex control plans are being developed to keep exploding vole populations in check should.
Of course, female vole also show this adaptation of their childbearing ability if they live in your garden when they are overpopulated In the vole-inhabited part of the garden, the voles stop throwing and there are radical incursions into the garden Density of individuals; the populations only come back to life after a while.
Because of this hormonal self-regulation of population density, you can manage that Voles in their garden by nature and ecologically sensible measures to a reasonable extent to keep. So you can (with the exception of a few mouse-related losses) harvest and carry chemically unpolluted fruits and vegetables it also contributes to the imbalance in our environment caused by intensive agriculture correct.
If, on the other hand, you do the same thing as agriculture, monocultures on largely dead garden soil and poison Against voles, create even more trouble with the now desperate female vole... the occasional article-appearing tularemia disease for which the evil voles are responsible should, affects between 3 and 15 people annually in Germany and ends in 5% of the cases treated fatal. Voles do not destroy the sward through their burrowing activity, but tend to them in the long term by loosening the soil, and the Defects only became weed if you did not re-sow and / or the lawn was made from a grass mixture that is not suitable for the location consists.

The water vole invasion

If so, it only makes sense to fight together

All of the suggestions just listed are suitable for dealing with the few voles that normally populate gardens. But, as I said, voles "practice gradation", field mice every 2 - 5 years, water voles every 5 - 8 years. Then the mouse population becomes quite powerful for a season, which is usually v. a. by the increased occurrence of predators - gradation is usually followed by a phase of Retrogradation, the mass increase collapses and the population density sinks below the regional average of the kind.
If your garden is plagued by a population of voles at the top of the gradation cycle and so within an all-around paved area (e. B. a settlement or allotment garden colony) is that excess voles have no chance to migrate, the most relaxed reaction would be to simply wait for the retrogradation.
If that does not work, because community members who are more remote from nature insist on quick reactions, then one may still be one A little faster pushing back of the population through control is possible, but this is only possible as a joint project of all those affected Sense. Then the fight should be done with the community organ of the settlement or the allotment garden board coordinated, a control plan must be drawn up, a different one for field mice than for Water voles.
The control of an overflowing water vole population is anything but straightforward if it is to be carried out correctly (in the sense of legal and successful). Here is an overview of the individual measures that are required in the context of a water vole control:

• Define the control period (only during the dormancy period from early autumn to March)
• Check early detection before damage occurs
• Identify water voles
• Differentiation from the protected mole
• Differentiation from field mouse infestation
• Possibly. (first) fighting the field mouse
• Dilapidation (drive on or not)
• If damage has occurred, check the damage
• Fighting is possible with bait stations
• Determination of number of bait places, area to be treated
• Placement and installation of the bait stations
• Installation of a non-poisoned control bait
• Baiting with rodenticide baits approved according to the list of plant protection products
• Marking of the bait stations via neighboring crops
• Weekly control of the seats
• Possibly. Follow-up baiting until bait is no longer accepted
• On areas in addition to other water vole populations, further control and, if necessary, Post-baiting
• Keeping of minutes
• After control, check the effectiveness by drawing a test in spring

It is also possible to control water vole with traps and by fumigation of the burrows, both methods are at least as complex, time-consuming and cost-intensive as combating with Bait stations. Numerous safety instructions must be observed during all control measures, because rodenticides and fumigants, highly effective poisons and traps, are not without danger. That goes from the certificate of competence or Fumigation certificate for the people carrying out the application, rules for handling and protective clothing to labeling the containers for storage and transport.
You can get a good overview of a systematic and sensible approach to water vole control in the long and detailed Publication "Practical Information Schermaus" by the Lower Saxony Ministry for Food, Agriculture and Consumer Protection procure. It is about afforestation of fields and meadows, on which the water vole really occasionally attracts attention (in the home garden that is rather a rare exception), but the fight is basically based on the same framework conditions and regulations: Download at www.ml.niedersachsen.de/download/3433/Praxis-Info_Schermaus_Erkennen_Bekaempfen_Vermeiden_22.10.2007_.pdf
What is an administrative offense or Offense dangerous or could be expensive, you can read in a publication of the Lower Saxony State Office for Consumer Protection and Food Safety, download at www.laves.niedersachsen.de/download/42421/Unsachgemaesses_Toeten_von_Maeusen_und_Ratten.pdf
About pesticides in general and the problems they (including pesticides mouse-killing rodenticides responsible) pharmaceutical industry, it goes on this page of the Federal Environment Agency: www.umweltbundesamt.de/daten/chemischem-in-der-umwelt/zahlen-ffekten-zu-chemischem-zur-chemischen
and in the current ARD documentary "Die Macht der Pharmaindustrie", presse.wdr.de/plounge/tv/das_erste/2016/04/20160411_akte_e.html