A Theory on Mole Gas

At midnight i went and plugged 3 holes next to foundation, the 4th was not through.

That because someone must have put (again) inside the galleries one of those mole chaser cartridges, that puts out smoke inside the galleries. Though moles probably leave, they come back soon. I know this from experience, this repeated almost daily, for years.

There has been a break for the last couple of years but this spring the moles came back.

Due to the way these buildings are made and the so called "stack effect" the smell comming out of mole galleries that end near foundation is being drawn into the walls and inside.

The smoke from cartridges gets inside through the same mechanism mole gas does. This always happens when i post something they don't like.

I have been reading again, the mole researchers did not change their point of view, but they now agree moles stink and confirm they keep up to 1000 worms alive in special "larders".

Besides the well known mounds which are actually nests build on higher ground where they keep their young, moles have to have breathing openings and the ideal place is near a building where it does not rain due to extension of roof. While the oxygen gets inside, also their "pungent odor" comes out.

While normal people who live in their own houses will not allow that, there are little choices when you live in a rented apartment.

So far i have tried many tricks available to me, the only one that seemed to work, but after a while, is repeatedly pouring cement mixed with soil in their breathing galleries and galleries under the mounds.

But wait to read more. Moles' main food is earthworms.

Though "researchers have dug out moles galleries", i believe they did not have a real interest in figuring how these animals really live.

First of all, unlike gophers which are herbivore or rats that are omnivores, they feed almost exclusively on worms have to eat up to 200 of them a day, and most "larders" store about double that amount. That would not suffice for more than two days, not all winter or drought. Earthworms are available most of the time, even in drought or winter, though in lower numbers.

I do not believe moles catch the worms, bite their heads and move them into larders, one by one.

On a healthy, green lawn, there are hundreds of earthworms underground per square meter. To understand moles, we first have to understand earthworms, their main food source.

Earthworms themselves do some agricultural work.

This ensures a large number of worms in a lawn, up to hundreds or even thousands on a square meter.

And here comes my theory. After invading a lawn, moles dig a number of galleries to ensure they have access to earthworms on the whole surface. However, they do not actively chase them.

Once a worm wonders in one of those galleries, it is doomed. The so called pungent smell of moles contains an enzyme (venom) that is aerosolized and spread throughout the galleries. When earthworms come in contact with that enzymes, they get zombified and move by themselves throughout that galleries until they reach the larder, which is the lowest point of the network.

In there they await alive to be eaten by moles.

If the moles breathing galleries are near a house, especially the light construction type, with empty walls and siding, due to natural thermal flow, which goes upward, gets inside the walls and ultimately rooms of the house, and the people living in there are affected.

Symptoms from breathing "mole gas" include sleepiness, lethargy, slow thinking, feeling like you're not yourself, carelessness, etc..  And like from every toxin, a certain high.