Protect Utah Trees and Lawns from Voles Before the Snow Flies

When the snow pulls back from a yard with voles, it shows the same thing: winding tracks through the grass and young trees with a ring of bark chewed off at the base. None of it happened in April. It happened over the winter, under the snow, where nobody could see it.

The fix has to happen before that, because once a heavy snow is down you cannot guard a tree or clear a runway. Most of Utah State University Extension's prevention steps are fall jobs.

Why winter works in a vole's favor

Voles are small rodents, roughly 3 to 6 inches long, with a tail covered in short hair. USU Extension notes that they prefer areas with heavy ground cover and that they damage lawns, gardens, irrigation pipes, and underground utility cables, along with stripping bark from trees and chewing roots. (USU Extension: Voles)

They do not hibernate. Snow is simply more cover. USU describes voles moving under the protection of snow all winter and building surface runways as they go. It also notes that girdling, when voles chew all the way around a trunk, usually happens in fall and winter and often is not discovered until the snow melts. (USU Extension: How to Prevent Vole Damage)

What vole damage looks like at snowmelt

USU describes runways 1 to 2 inches wide across the lawn, with numerous small burrow openings. Grass along well-used runways is clipped close to the ground, and droppings and bits of vegetation collect inside them. On trees, the bark is gnawed in irregular patches at ground level, with tooth marks about 1/8 inch wide by 3/8 inch long.

That bark damage is the expensive part. USU notes that young trees girdled more than 50 percent of the way around the trunk have a low survival rate. Guarding the tree in fall is far easier than trying to save it in spring.

If you are not sure whether you are dealing with voles or pocket gophers, our guide to telling gophers and voles apart covers the signs.

Guard young trees before the first heavy snow

USU's recommendation for protecting young trees is a hardware cloth cylinder around the base of the trunk. Use mesh of one-quarter inch or smaller, bury the bottom 3 inches below ground so voles cannot tunnel underneath, and make the cylinder taller than the typical snow line.

Size the height to your own yard. Snow usually piles deeper on a Park City lot than on the Salt Lake Valley floor, and a guard that ends below the snow gives voles a way over the top.

Take away the cover

Voles stay where they can hide. USU recommends cutting back their cover in several ways:

• Keep at least a 3-foot circle of bare soil around the base of trees, especially young ones.
• Lower the height and thickness of ground cover, and mow the lawn very short on the last mowing of the fall.
• Cut back weeds, dense ornamental plantings, and heavy mulch that give voles food and shelter.
• Reduce clutter in the yard.
• Where you can, leave a 6- to 8-foot strip of bare soil between your yard and the open field or native habitat next to it.

That last step matters most for homes that back onto open ground, a canal bank, or undeveloped land, where voles can move in from the edges.

Traps and bait stations

USU suggests snap traps set with the trigger right in an active runway. For areas with a history of vole damage, it recommends bait stations placed in the fall, just before the first heavy snowstorm. Bait stations help keep pets and non-target animals away from the bait, and USU reminds homeowners to read the label carefully. Its vole guide also notes that rodenticides may be needed to control voles across large areas.

Bait is where most homeowners should slow down. Toxic bait around a yard with kids, dogs, or cats needs careful placement. Our technicians keep bait in locked, tamper-resistant stations, and traps go into the runways that show current activity.

If the damage is already done next spring

USU has advice for the morning the snow melts and the runways are already there. Rake out the dead grass as soon as you can so the grass crowns start growing sooner and the lawn can recover over the summer. For trees, the outlook depends on how far around the trunk the bark is gone. USU says tree wound dressings will not help. Keeping stress down with the right amount of water and fertilizer through the growing season does.

Then plan the guards and the bare-soil circles for next fall, so the same trees are not starting over again.

When to call for help

A few runways in one flower bed are a weekend project. Runways across the whole lawn, damage to irrigation lines, or a row of young trees at risk are a bigger job. So is a yard that backs onto a field where voles keep coming back.

Our vole removal service starts by figuring out which runways are active, then places control where voles actually travel. We also install hardware cloth guards on at-risk trunks and clear the ground cover voles depend on. If mounds are part of the picture too, our gopher removal service handles the other half. Either way, the best time to call is before the first heavy snow.

Frequently asked questions

Related reading

• Vole removal service
• Pocket gophers vs voles: how to tell them apart
• Gopher removal service