Ground Hogs

[Dennisfly]

My city house has a wood decked front porch under which two (or more) ground hogs have taken up residence. The lot adjoins a wooded area where the ground hogs had resided but now they seem to be under the porch.

I want to get the house ready to sell and potential buyers probably wouldn't be favorably impressed by the resident hogs. They appear on the lawn and sometimes even sun themselves on the porch. They also chew on the lattice that covers the porch sides at the bottom. I expect they have a tunnel under the porch (there are trails or paths) but it is too low for me to crawl under.


It's illegal to discharge a firearm in the county and I don't want to use poison due to dogs, cats, etc.

I thought about a wire cage trap but don't know if it would work. (once in a while a skunk will visit. What would I do if I trapped it in the cage?) How about some kind of repellent. Maybe I need a professional pest controller?

Any and all comments/suggestions are welcome.

 

[scott_vt]

Mornin Dennis,
You might try taking a look at this web site !BestNest.com Search

 

[shvl73]

I wouldn't hesitate to use the smoke bombs if you can find both holes (if there are two entrances) .

 

[LoneCowboy]

they make a couple different kinds of poison gas for controlling them
and you really want to control them, they are just big rats, carry diseases and breed like crazy.
get it handled.

 

[SpringHollow]

Every couple of years, my father has someone trap some that start living under his shed. Live Have a Heart trap with cabbage and carrots placed a few feet away. The guy takes them to a farmer he knows and releases them. The farmer probably then charges people money if they want to hunt them!

 

[Podunkadunk]

Every couple of years, my father has someone trap some that start living under his shed. Live Have a Heart trap with cabbage and carrots placed a few feet away. The guy takes them to a farmer he knows and releases them. The farmer probably then charges people money if they want to hunt them!

Oxymoron.

 

[schmism]

if your sqemish about what to do with a full trap, rain barrel/water tub is by far the best and easyest way to handle the situation.

 

[ShaleniFarm]

Dennis,
I use a conibear trap to get ground hogs around the horse farm.

Set it and forget it, but check on it every morning. (Be sure to anchor it to something.)

Like this, but a bigger one....

Have a good one,
Neil.

 

[ToadHill]

You could use my Grandfathers method. When he was a kid on the farm, they would wait for the hog to get away from his hole to feed. Then come out of hiding, run like mad and get between the hog and its hole and bear them with a club.

 

[Harvster]

I've caught half a dozen or so near my garden with the live trap. Went and dropped them off at the state park a few miles away. Bait I used was either cantaloupe (that's what they like to eat from my garden) or a small square of paper towel with a couple drops of vanilla extract. They seem to go for those sweet smells.

 

[Jimbrown]

Well excepting the fact that i have often been told i am wierd. Did you ever consider the fact that some buyers might find it cute to have some resident wild life. I realize that no real estate agent would agree, but who knows.

 

[MossRoad]

The problem with gassing it next to you house is twofold...
1. The gas could seep into your house.
2. The groundhog could die in the hole next to your house. Then it will stink for two weeks (happened to my sister when they gassed one under their garage).

Try a live trap. Buy it, hose it off a few times. Use no soaps. Throw dirt at it, etc... try to get it to smell like the area under your porch, not oiled metal. Put it under your porch, right in front of the groundhog hole. Dig the hole entrance out a bit to fit the trap. Use some scrap lumber staked into the ground to make a funnel that forces it to go out or into the tunnel through the trap. Put some dirt on the bottom of the trap, too. You'll get it. Throw a burlap bag over the trap to calm it down. Take it far, far away, prefferably to an alley behind a friend's house with nice flowers and landscaping and let it go. Or maybe just out to a nature preserve, not a farm field. Why make it the farmer's problem?

 

[Cliff_Johns]

OK, here's what you do.

First, you get a set of quality vice-grips. Then you kneel by the entrance and slap the ground every three seconds. This mimics the mating tail slap of the Mountain Ground Hog. When the ground hog comes out to see who's making the teasing sounds you grab it by the nose with the vice-grips and stuff it in a bag. This works for the females.

For the males, you put a TV ten feet from the entrance to the hole, and the remote five feet from the entrance, then put Heidi (the movie) on the TV. When the ground hog comes out to change the channel to the football game, you grab him by the ... uh ... well, the nose and stuff him in a bag.

Cliff

 

[HomeBrew2]

OK, here what you do. ...

Rural life is so challenging