We are not aware of any repellent technique that effectively and reliable works to control moles and voles (they are often confused with each other). Fortunately, they tend to not live very long, and predators often catch and eat them. Otherwise, trapping (live or lethal) tends to be the most immediate and practical option, with traps placed in active tunnels. If you use lethal traps, we do not recommend the use of poison bait, which can affect other wildlife (and potentially outdoor pets) if they encounter the poisoned mole/vole. If poisoned bait must be used, hire a professional pesticide applicator (baits are classified as pesticides) so they can be chosen carefully and closely monitored.

Lawn damage is often blamed on grubs that aren't numerous enough to be responsible for visible damage, even if they are present. Make sure there are grubs abundant enough to be above a threshold noted on the linked page before deciding to apply treatment, since any pesticide (natural or synthetic) used for grub control might harm other species. (Firefly larvae, for example, hunt for other insects to eat on the ground.) Additionally, controlling grubs won't necessarily make a mole move on to new habitat, since they can also eat earthworms and other soil invertebrates.

Miri

Hi Miri! Thank you so much for the quick response & your info! I have lots of tunnels. How do I know how many traps to use, where to put them & whether or not they’re active? I also have a lot of squirrels digging in my yard.

Pulling up the sod in a square foot of lawn area to check on grub numbers is the simplest approach to determine if grubs are abundant enough to be worth treating. If the sod requires a shovel to strip that much grass of the soil, then you probably don't have a bad grub problem since grubs would be eating enough turf roots that it detaches fairly easily and can be lifted up with less effort.

We do not recommend that any insecticide grub control be applied unless grubs are proven to be abundant enough to be causing damage. Otherwise, any chemical applied might harm other insects (including those that eat grubs and other lawn pests), and any non-chemical application like nematodes or milky spore disease might simply be a wasted effort. If pesticides are not routinely used, older, well-established lawns tend to have enough natural predators, parasites, and insect-infecting pathogens in the soil to keep grub populations below damaging levels. Although they are not the only species of grub in lawns, Japanese Beetle grubs tend to be most common in newer developments with Kentucky bluegrass sod, as they rarely damage tall fescue lawns enough to be noticeable.

White grub chemical controls can be preventative or curative. If you have a history of grub issues in an area, use preventative chemical controls to help prevent future grub problems. Curative chemical controls target and help manage present grubs. Consider the time of year and whether it would be best to apply a curative control (early to mid-summer) vs. a preventative control (late summer).

Timing is critical when applying grub-control chemical products, as many are only effective during specific stages of the white grub life cycle. If you choose to use chemical treatments, always read and follow the label instructions to ensure you are applying the product at the recommended time of year. Most products are not effective when applied in the spring. Depending on the product, the earliest recommended treatments typically begin around June. Other products will only be effective if applied in late summer. In spring, grubs are moving closer to the soil surface, but they don't feed for very long before pupating to mature into adults, and the grass more easily outgrows any grub damage that time of year anyway. They to interrupting the beetle's life cycle is to control a new generation of young grubs, and the eggs of Japanese Beetles and their relatives that can inhabit lawns are laid in summer.

White grub chemical control products should be irrigated (watered-in) after treatment according to specific label directions. If using grub control pesticides over multiple growing seasons, consider rotating pesticides with different modes of action to reduce the likelihood of resistance (the pest becoming resistant to the pesticide). Each pesticide label includes information about its mode of action, typically identified by a group number or letter. Active ingredients in products used for grub control can include:

• Chlorantraniliprole – Used as a preventative that can also help to manage surface-feeding lawn insects like sod webworms and cutworms; typically it is most effective when applied in May or June.
• Imidacloprid – Used as a preventative and sometimes as a curative. Maryland law restricts the use of this class of chemical (neonicotinoids) to certified pesticide applicators; they cannot be applied outdoors by home gardeners. Imidacloprid can have negative impacts on pollinators. Typically it is most effective when applied in late June or early August.
• Trichlorfon – Used as a curative and is typically most effective when applied late August or early September.

Penn State's information on mole management notes that typically there are only 2-3 moles per acre, so traps don't need to be numerous, and they are only effective in placed in active tunnels. The linked page describes how to know a tunnel is active, and they also go into more detail on trap design options.

Squirrel digging is almost certainly unrelated to whatever else is going on, and they may be burying (or this time of year, retrieving) stored nuts or seeds like acorns, hickory, and walnut. There isn't a good way to discourage squirrel activity unless a hawk were to take up residence nearby.

Miri