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You dug over the garden, planted grass seed, watered and cared for it until it was the perfect lawn you always wanted. Then one morning you discovered it was covered in small brown pyramids. Your heart sank, your blood pressure shot up, and seconds later the entire neighbourhood knew you had a problem with moles.

Some people might recommend buying children's windmills, the sort that are attached to a stick. The plan being that as the windmill turns, the noise it makes will frighten away the moles. It sounds reasonable so you give it a go. What actually happens is, the mole hears the noise coming from recent holes, so it makes some more in a quieter part of the lawn.

Others might suggest squashing the mole hills back down, so the mole gives up and moves to another garden. This one is never going to work. The garden is now as flat as it was before, and looks just as inviting to the mole as it did in the first place. Only now he's cross at his hard work being undone, so he builds the next ones bigger.

How about putting fireworks in the mole hill? This will attract neighbourhood children and their parents to watch the display, and one of two things will happen. Either someone will complain that you are being cruel to moles and report you to the RSPCA, or the local cats and dogs will freak out, and everyone will shout at you for scaring them. Whichever happens, the whole neighbourhood will be there to witness your humiliation.

Mole traps will work, but.. If they are the humane kind where the mole is unharmed you still have to kill it, or take it a long distance away so it doesn't come back. If they are the fatal kind, you will have to explain to your children why you killed such a tiny, apparently cute and harmless, little creature. In their eyes you are now a murderer and public enemy number one.

At this point there are only three realistic options.
1 Accept the mole hills and give up on having a perfect lawn.
2 Move to another area.
3 Buy a gun, sit up all night, then when you see it blow its head off. This is the only method guaranteed to work. Though it is sure to attract interest from the local police force, who might be less than understanding about gunshots in the middle of the night.

Learn more about this author, Gill Hamper.
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