Holes in Your Lawn? Here’s the Simple Way to Identify Them

As the snow melts away, you might begin noticing various holes throughout the yard. Before you grab pesticide or a trap, you need to determine what’s living in those holes first. Don’t worry, you don’t need to camp out beside the hole and wait for something to crawl or slither out. All you need to make a strong educated guess as to what’s taken up residence in your yard is a tape measure. 

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Using a Tape Measure to Determine a Hole’s Occupant

Use a tape measure to measure the diameter of the hole. Based on that alone, you can get a pretty good idea of what’s living in it:

Bees and Wasps

Ground nesting bees and wasps like to dig holes in the soil. Bee holes are usually about 1/8 to 1/2-inch in diameter while wasp holes are larger at 1/2 to 1 inch in diameter. These holes usually have loose soil around the opening. Similar to most animals that dig holes, they do so for shelter and reproducing. Wasps will also sometimes use old holes created by rodents. You’ll usually find these holes in the summer and fall. While ground bees are generally harmless and function as valuable pollinators, yellow jackets can be particularly dangerous, especially since people can stumble upon the holes unknowingly. 

Chipmunks or Voles

Chipmunks and voles are professional burrowers capable of digging a complex system of tunnels in your yard, which they use for nesting, shelter, and storing food. Look for holes that are typically 2 to 3 inches wide and near structure, like your home’s foundation, patios, and sidewalks. Their holes won't have raised ridges around them as chipmunks carry away the dirt in their cheeks to disguise the holes. 

Rats

Rats typically dig holes that are 2 to 4 inches wide. You’ll usually find them around your foundation, under wood piles, or in overgrown parts of your yard and around fences, retaining walls, and sheds. Signs of rat holes are usually fan shaped soil piles created when they dig the holes and droppings 1-inch long and cylindrical. You’ll also see worn down paths around the hole. If you’re not sure if the hole is active, stuff it with dirt or paper, wait a day, and return to see if it’s cleaned out.

Groundhogs

Groundhog holes are usually 10 to 12 inches wide and burrow systems of holes that are usually around 30 feet long. These larger animals create larger holes. They also typically make 2 to 5 entrances to their network of tunnels. You can find groundhog holes in a variety of places, including in open fields, among trees, in bushes or even up against your home’s foundation. You’ll typically find a mound of fresh dirt in a fanned out pattern around freshly dug holes. 

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Snakes

Snakes don’t dig their own holes. They take them over, often devouring the hole’s inhabitants in the process. If you suspect that a snake has taken up residence in a hole in your yard, look for telltale signs, such as shed skin, a smoother out rim around the hole. Snakes usually go for holes that are 1 to 2 inches wide. 

What Lives Where You Live

While measuring the holes in your yard and observing the area around them can help you determine what’s living in it, it also helps to familiarize yourself with what critters live in your neck of the woods. The easiest way to do that is to visit your local ag extension’s website. The site extension.org, offers a comprehensive list of ag extensions by state.