The Mother Nature Lawn Pest Control Company

What is it with humans that makes us so smug about our stewardship of the world we live in? I’m not talking about the planetary issues politicians and scientists scream at each other, leaving you and me to recycle a bit, think about buying a hybrid car, and in general hope for the best.

No, it’s that little band of green that surrounds many of our homes that concerns me. It’s called a yard.

We think we know what’s out there, but that is becoming increasingly untrue.One good example was the late summer “who’s been in my back yard?” conversations with friends, neighbours, and complete strangers at the garden department of Canadian Tire.

A post-tropical weather event had soaked our part of the world, and everyone was complaining about holes and ripped up sods that magically appeared over the following few days in their lawns. There was a lot of blame flying around. If everything accused had actually been ripping, shredding, boring, and plucking, the villains would have included flickers, chipmunks, skunks, racoons, squirrels, and starlings. And those are just the ones I overheard.

The irony was, no matter who did the digging, the lawn owners were themselves the real cause. The critters were simply Mother Nature’s messengers, telling them they hadn’t been looking after their lawns.

Perhaps it isn’t really all the property owners fault. Chemicals have for the most part been banned in these parts. The message is to “Go Green” and tend your lawn the natural way, but unfortunately that means, for many people, do nothing except cutting it.

Pay attention. Here’s what happens when we get a heavy rainfall on an in-vogue “natural” lawn. All those creepy crawley little things that like to nibble on grass roots, but have gone deep to escape summer dryness, are drawn toward the surface by new moisture. These are delicacies for skunks and racoons, who seem to know the moment they arrive and start grubbing for supper.

You can name your problem by looking at the nature of the digging. If the lawn is full of conical holes about four inches across, it’s a skunk after white grubs (June bug larvae). If the sod is ripped off and rolled back in strips, it’s a racoon, after the same meal.

Those two, and those two only, were to blame for all the post-rainfall damage last summer. Anyone blaming other creatures was badly off target. If you see flickers, a type of woodpecker, feeding on your lawn, you’ve got ants, lots of them. They form about 45% of a flicker’s diet, supplemented with white grubs and leather jackets (crane fly larvae). Flickers peck, they don’t rip. So do starlings, which can come down on you in huge flocks. They love leatherjackets, not surprisingly since both crane fly and starling are European imports with a very long relationship.
As for squirrels and chipmunks, they hide stuff but not in a way that requires ripping up sod. Just don’t let them in your house. That’s where they do their real damage.

If you don’t want critters, furred or feathered, bothering you and your back yard, don’t invite them. As Hope For Wildlife Director Hope Swinnimer of Seaforth suggested recently, if Mother Nature’s yard crew is at work on your lawn, they are helping you, whether you realize it or not. Don’t treat them as the enemy. What they’re eating is the enemy. Understand they are doing something that is natural to them, and consider that if you want your yard maintenance done “naturally”, this is part of it.