I frequently find moles captured on various parts of their body. However, here's a first for me. This mole was captured by the nape of his neck & back and then continued to pull the trap through the tunnel until it expired. (You can actually see the fold of skin that was in the trap)

BTW Rocky - After I receive an order of traps I go over every one of them. The first thing I do is remove all of the safetys so they are not inadvertently on when I leave the job. Nothing like doing a trap check and finding sprung traps with the safety on! I then use a file to at least round off the end of the trigger as the shearing leaves a raised area - and some may need more than others. I occasionally bend a trigger/rod but not very often. The stress of the set trap will usually bend it enough over time. I also file down any unusual amounts of cast flashing while I'm filing to prevent cuts and abrasions. I then make sure the end of jaws do not hit each other when closing and will use a flat screwdriver to adjust them as needed. I like a 1/2" of travel on my pans so the trigger may need to be filed down to allow for this. Then the traps are set up overnight on a table to see if any trip and need further adjustment. I also touch up the paint where I have filed and all other traps are painted twice during the season. I am a firm believer that if you take care of these traps they will last for many years. Even though I have experimented with stainless additions to the trap I found that the cost and labor involved did not warrant it as it is cheaper to buy another new trap. I have some other tweaks that I won't disclose but those are the main ones that every new trap receives. Over time you will find what works good for you as well.

TTT - Just in case you missed out...

Oh, how you do go on...

Yes, I agree with this advice, but I think it applies equally whether you're just using your thumbs to push down an area just under the pan, or whether you're digging out and collapsing a rectangular area of soil for the entire trap.

I feel that I'm pretty adept at catching moles. This job has me scratchin my head, not really the catching part, but rather how do the moles get to this isolated island of landscaping around a hotel flagpole? From everything I know of mole behavior they must either push the soil up or bring it up into a mound to travel. There are not mounds or tunnels across the paved parking lot. Did they climb over the 8" curb, jump, mole eggs stuck to a birds foot? lol

I have had commercial accounts such as strip centers in high traffic areas where the moles popped up in the islands of turf that were no more than 10' x 20' and surrounded by hundreds of feet of pavement. I was always amazed at how far they would dig under the pavement and at times just thought they parachuted in at night.

I have seen Moles running on top of the Ground to another location.

Was that during a heavy rain storm ?

They traveled under the pavement !

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They traveled under the pavement ! [/quote]

Yeah, I figured that. What I'm curious about is in everything I've studied they must raise a tunnel or make a series of mounds if tunneling more than a few inches deep. What do they do with their diggings to get under the approx. 60ft. of paved parking lot?

I have been using the mole spade its fast and has been workin well for me. I am intrested in this "nose guide" That Mr Jameson talks about. I dont seem to have many refusals or go arounds but am all ears for learnin nobody knows it all.

I make my nose cones out of clay...right on site...

What is the benefit to traping moles, I trap, never a mole. I have seen them or seen what they have done to my yard and veg. garden. So besides the fact that your yard will be free of holes, what is the real benefit to traping moles.

Only one mole for the past 2 days. We had a cold front come through but now it's trying to warm back up!


TJ

$$$

River rat is right, we professional ADC guys trap moles because people are willing to pay us to do it.

But why do our clients want to get rid of them? I trap both gophers and moles, and the gophers eat and kill plants, so there's no question about getting rid of them in a landscape. You really have to get rid of them, as they are so destructive. Moles don't eat plants, they eat worms and insects, but they can do a lot of cosmetic damage to a landscape. Personally, I don't care that much about mole signs in my own yard, but the cosmetic damage that moles do does matter a lot to some people. We professional mole trappers tend to wind up working for fairly wealthy folks who have put a lot of money into having a nice looking garden, and the simply don't want to see the disruption and dirt piles that moles cause. It's important to them, and that's what matters.