You can see their devastation upon the land all the way from the Quillayute Prairie to Ford Park, Bogachiel Way to the cemetery, they show no respect for the living or the dead, they are moles, and they strike fear into the hearts of lawn lovers everywhere. The question always is how do you get rid of them? Here are a few mole facts.

An average mole, though weighing just 5 or 6 ounces, can dig up to 18 feet per hour through the less-dense upper soil of a lawn. Surprisingly moles are unsociable creatures, so while it may look like you have a whole mole family it is probably just a few doing all the damage.

You may ask yourself why do I have moles? Moles are a water animal. They’re attracted to the wet soil, so right off the bat we have a huge problem there, when is the ground not wet?

The number of wild remedies is a testament to the frustration moles cause. There are hundreds of wives’ tales: human hair, razor blades, hooking up your car exhaust to tunnels, putting chewing gum in the tunnels, one woman said she put rose branches in the tunnels hoping the little buggers would cut themselves and bleed to death.

When the home remedies don’t work industry has come up with some options: poison, windmills and sonic ringers, smoke cartridges, and finally trapping which is against the law in Washington.

Maybe we have been going about getting rid of the moles all wrong, maybe we need to take legal action? It works in other areas, moles certainly have not filed any environmental impact statements that I am aware of.

And I would just bet that they are way out of compliance with the 1-800-dig rule. Drag them in to court so they won’t have time to dig and nobody is going to want to represent them, what self respecting attorney wants "Mole Lawyer" on his business card?

That probably wouldn’t work in the end; the case would drag on because moles can’t see and that would cause major delays if evidence was presented, the mole would claim he couldn’t see Exhibit "A" and then everything would have to be described in detail for the mole. Even with mounds of evidence it would be a tough case.

A recent call to Jerry’s and a conversation regarding mole elimination services offered one word from Leppell "Diesel" he said moles hate it. I am not certain if he was suggesting filling up a big truck with diesel and running over them or dumping it in the mole tunnel, for more specific details give Jerry a call.

The last thought about getting rid of moles is about not getting rid of them, there is a remedy where the mole hill is pushed down and over time the mole will dig deeper. That is lot of mole hill stomping and time but it might work.  

Maybe the answeris to embrace the mole. The mole brings real benefit to a lawn, if you can stand it; a typical mole eats 45-50 pounds of insects and worms annually, according to one study. And the grasses and excrement it leaves underground are good for the soil, maybe we can start a "Moles are Cool" campaign.

Put our West End mole up against Punxsutawney Phil, maybe Monty Mole would be a good name and you know he is never going to see his shadow.