Moles do eat Japanese Beetle grubs and there is another grub that does great damage to lawns that is on the moles diet.

I don't know if they eat hosta, who does know?

And then there are Voles, little mice like creatures, and they employ moles as contractors to build tunnels. These Voles love hostas, particularly the rootsystem of the plant. While slithering through these tunnels and perusing the underwold of your hosta bed, the stumble upon the bottom end of your hosta plants and have a feast.
When a hosta plant is diung poorly, dig it up and if a lot of roots are missing you know you got voles.
If you see a hole in the ground, place an apple slice next to it and cover it with a flower pot. If the apple disappears in a day or so, you got moles.

"If the apple disappears in a day or so, you got moles."

Fred, do you mean moles or voles?

i have pure sand .... by august its like concrete ...

i have drip irrigation ... guess which soil is damp and soft by August ...

they tunnel straight down the irrigation lines ...

the only problem i have.. on smaller hosta.. is that they tunnel under them .. and then they fall into the tunnel.. and end up planted a couple inches too deep ... and small ones can disappear ...

bigger hosta have bigger root mass .. and the tunnelers tend to go around them rather than battle through the roots ..

ken

I live in shrew heaven here - smaller than a mole but also insect eaters. Last year during the drought the shrews would dig miles through our hard packed clay fields to get to my nice moist flower beds.

Small or newly planted plants, the shrews will tunnel under them and flip them over. Slightly bigger plants they continue under and create air pockets so the roots die. You end up with two different sections of the same plant but separated by a distance. Bigger plants they go around and make a complete circle of upturned soil. One section they have tunneled around all the hosta and companion plants and it looks like I planted them in small valleys.

Currently I have a 3" wide strip of lawn they are using as a runway to get to who knows where. Even though I stomp the soil down every day, sometimes twice a day, the grass is dead in that area. It looks like someone took Round Up to kill a long strip of grass.

On the upside, I don't have to worry about grubs or worms when I dig - they have eaten them all. Shrews are smaller than moles but not as nasty a voles. As much as I hate them, I can live with shrews. I could solve the problem if those three overfed cats would do their job.

Butch,
you are very observent. It is the VOLES that eat the apples, not the moles.

Tks Fred, you to are very attentive.

Some of the best questions and observations on the list!

Your stuff should be roaring along about now.

BTW, Fred I wasn't being polite or poopy, I really didn't know.

I'm positive I have moles. Any idea's on controling them?

"I'm positive I have moles. Any idea's on controling them?"

I wouldn't bother!

I had a real problem with them and field mice for the past couple of years. About three years ago the mice started shredding my hosta leaves apart to put into the crevices between my rocks and build a nest. The only thing that worked was a product called "Just One Bite" and I haven't had a problem with field mice in that area. However, the tunneling over the winter and the nests that they built under the snow and the grass they destroyed was something else. Then I noticed a mole or vole, whatever it was. So this winter my husband bought more of the "Just One Bite" sticks and plastic hinged containers for 99 cents (like the one salads come in) and these containers have a hole in either side of them, just big enough for the little critters. (We purchased these at TSC) He strategically put them in my hosta beds and I haven't had any sign of them. I know that this product should be kept away from pets, so I'm pretty sure that it's not an eco friendly alternative, but for us it's done the trick (we don't have any pets and our backyard is fenced in). I'd be happy to hear from anyone out there if there is a friendlier alternative.