If you’re concerned about rodents and small mammals damaging your property or spreading disease, we offer quick and efficient ways to prevent and eliminate them. First, though, it’s good to have an understanding of the rodents and small pests we have here in the UK and how to identify them so that you’re better prepared to protect against them.
Characterised by their ever-growing incisors, rodents must continuously gnaw and chew to keep their teeth in check. This behaviour often causes significant damage to homes and businesses, as they can chew through wires, walls, fences, feeders, and more. While insectivores like shrews don’t have these same teeth characteristics, they do still enjoy chewing, especially on trunks, stems and roots.
In the second post of our common UK pests series, we’ll discuss the UK’s most common vole, shrew and mole species, how best to identify them, and what you can do to remove their presence from your property.
Shrews
Shrews are very small insectivores that have the power to cause noticeable and costly damage to property, homes and even your pets via the diseases they can carry.
Shrews like to dig, leaving tunnels in turf that can be irritating to fix and damaging or killing trees and plant life by digging through roots. Due to their size, shrews can very easily find their way into homes and buildings via even the smallest gaps in foundations, doors, windows and walls, so ensure you have no spaces for them to squeeze through.
Territory markers by nature, shrews will leave behind a terrible smell, making homes and work buildings unpleasant to be in. Like rats and mice, shrews can carry diseases that can contaminate water and food supplies, as well as infect your domestic wildlife. Hantavirus is just one of these diseases, which can infect and sicken entire flocks of captive birds.
Small and pointed, these pests need to be kept away from your property.
Common shrew
Common shrews can be identified by their three-toned fur. They’re dark brown on their backs and white on their undersides, with a transitional colour of light brown around their sides. A common shrew’s tail is only half the length of its body, just slightly shorter than a pygmy shrew’s. These shrews grow to around 4-8cm in length, and you’ll typically find them in grassland and woodland areas.
Water shrew
The largest of the UK’s shrew species, the water shrew grows to 6-10cm in length. It has very dark fur on its back and pale grey on its underside, creating a distinct contrast that’s easy to spot. Water shrews have elongated noses and sometimes white fur around the eyes. Water shrews, as the name suggests, live in wetlands and around streams, and they even swim. These insectivores have venomous saliva, which can paralyse larger prey, like frogs.
Pygmy shrew
The smallest shrew at 4-6cm long, this creature has a thicker tail than other shrew species, which grows to typically two-thirds the length of its body. Its fur is brown and transitions to an off-white underside. You’ll find this shrew across many habitats, including grasslands, woodlands and hedgerows.
Voles
These mice-like rodents are capable of causing frustrating damage to outdoor property. Another digger, voles can leave your land covered in golf ball-sized holes, allowing for water to accumulate and cause issues. They like to form runways from their constant activity, leaving ball tracks through grass covered in their waste.
As with other rodents, voles love to chew, as this keeps their continuously growing teeth in check. They will chew through crops, and, if their food source is low, they’ll eat the bark off stems or trunks. This is called girdling, and it interrupts the flow of nutrients and water to the rest of the plant, killing it or its branches. Voles are especially a threat to woody ornamental trees, shrubbery, and young trees.
Bank vole
The bank vole can be identified by its red-brown coat and its grey underside. Its tail is half the length of its body, which is its main identifier when distinguishing it from the field vole. This vole grows to 9-11cm long and lives in hedgerows, grassland, woodland, heathland, and urban areas.
Field vole
The field vole looks very similar to the bank vole, so distinguishing between them can be difficult. Look for its cooler coat of yellow-brown and short tail to identify it. These voles grow to 9-12cm long and are found in ungrazed grasslands and tussock areas. However, this vole will make a home wherever it has access to grass.
Water vole
Water voles are not pests, but it is important to mention them on our list to raise awareness of this creature. Water voles are an endangered species in the UK and, therefore, should not be injured or killed. If you affect a water vole’s habitat or cause a vole harm, you could be fined up to £5,000 and be sentenced to up to 6 months in prison.
Water voles are larger than other species, with chestnut-brown fur, small ears, a fluffy tail and a rounded nose. It is sometimes mistaken for a brown rat, but brown rats are larger. Another telltale sign of water voles is in their poo – they tend to create a ‘latrine’ and pile their waste up by the water, whereas rats will leave their droppings behind them as they go.
Moles
Moles can cause a great deal of property damage, all while keeping completely out of sight.
These underground diggers can disturb roots, uproot plants and crops, contaminate soil quality, cause water accumulation from their tunnels, and contribute to the freeze-thaw cycle. This cycle is when water sits in the soil around the foundations of a building, which then freezes when temperatures drop, then thaws, then freezes, and so on. This process eventually causes cracks, chipping, and moisture issues that can be costly to repair.
The European mole is very easy to identify. Moles are small and very round, with black, velvet-look fur. Their front paws are large and flat with long, thick claws used for their constant digging.
Protect your property and animals with AFS Supplies
The AFS team is here to help if you need support in preventing or eliminating these rodents and insectivores from your property.
We have a varied range of rodenticides and rat traps to suit your needs, like the Vertox Excel Rate Bait, which can be used with the Covered Rat Bait Station to trap any of the above small mammals.
For more specific solutions, such as a mole problem, traps like the Talpirid Mole Trap are efficient and fairly unobtrusive.
Need personalised advice tailored to your pest problem? Get in touch with our team on 01842 765 634 today. Our experts are ready to support you, and our years of experience allow us to give you top advice and suggestions.
