North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Ernest Plutko" <ernestplutko@wiktel.com>]

Meadow voles grow to 16 cm or 6.3 in.   Weigh 50 grams or 1.8 oz.

---- Original Message ----
From: alandhaigh@gmail.com
To: nafex@lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: RE: [NAFEX] voles, size and trapping
Date: Tue, 27 Apr 2010 04:18:17 -0500

> A 6" long vole? Must be a wood rat, which I haven't heard about
>doing
>damage to trees.
>
>As far as how to trap, I'll elaborate on what I wrote here a couple
>of days
>ago.  I use whole almonds or peanuts as bait in the improved rodent
>traps
>sold by Gemplers and cover with a large plastic tray- the black type
>used
>for mixing small batches of cement (about 2' long).  Peanut butter
>gets
>eaten to quickly by ants here (in fall, not winter)  which will also
>more
>slowly consume the whole nuts.  I'll put about 4 traps under each
>tray
>including a rat trap under a few of the trays to stop rats or chip
>monks
>from springing all the traps and taking the bait.  I move the 8 trays
>around
>my property when I stop getting hits at a given site and in about a
>month
>and a half I've covered my whole 2 acre nursery.
>
>Before big snows you may want to gather the traps and trays and put
>back out
>after snow stops.  The black plastic makes a warm rodent refuge on
>sunny
>days.  Here in southeastern NY I begin trapping in mid-Nov which is
>usually
>a long while before serious winter weather.