I have voles in my basement, which sounds crazy considering they live and tunnel under grass. Honestly, when I heard other people talk about having voles in their homes anywhere, I would roll my eyes because to me it seemed obvious that only mice (not voles) get inside of houses. I WAS WRONG! At first, I even thought my own rodent problem was mice and not voles, I was completely convinced that a vole couldn’t get inside, and my husband was more than happy to say “I told you so”, when we got the news.
We have had a very prevalent vole problem since earlier in spring, they tore apart our grass leaving trails and dead grass in their wake; and they killed my husband’s vegetable garden! They ate through everything they could find including the flower beds; basically, almost everything in our backyard is either dead or dying because of these nasty rodents. My husband was very upset about the loss of his vegetables, so he decided to start a small garden in the basement and try to get somewhat of a harvest. What we couldn’t believe was when, somehow, the voles got into the basement and started slowly working their way through that garden as well.
I saw one run from the basement garden to a crack in the wall and vanish, and later that day our dog was barking and digging at the outside part of the home that almost directly lines up with the crack in the basement. Then, I came face to face with one when I was doing laundry and I couldn’t deny the truth any longer: I had voles in my basement. Now, we just need to figure out how to REMOVE the voles from the basement, which is our number one priority at this point. I may have been wrong about what kind of rodent it was, but I’m not wrong when I say that it can’t stay.