(paghat) wrote in message ...
In article ,
(jay) wrote:

Some kind of animal has been visited my backyard lawn every night for
a few days. It has digged the grass root out over a large portion of
the lawn and I really need to get rid of it. I do not see any tunnel,
so it is probably not a mole. What are the other types of animals that
may have caused my headache? I will go to home depot tonight to get
traps or repellant. Before I go there, please give me some
recommendataions. Thanks.

Are they cone-shaped holes? If they are, your lawn has a grub infestation
that is far more dangerous to the turf than the skunk who is actually
helping you out by eating the grubs.

If its really "a large portion" as you say, of lawn stripped more
haphazardly rather than conical holes, then that would be the doing of
raccoons, maybe a mom teaching a couple adolescents how to find grubs, so
they could do a lot broader lawn-ripping than a lone skunk. If they come
back every night, your grub infestation must be a doozy.

In either case, treat the grub problem & the rest will take care of
itself. The organic control is the nematode Heterorhabditis bacteriophora,
available from many companies such as:
http://www.goodbug-shop.com/nematodes.htm
But read up on them first; timing is everything.\

-paghat the ratgirl

I stayed up late last night and saw this raccoon digging. I sneaked
out and threw a tenis ball to it. Though I misssed it, it seems that
it got scared from coming back, cause I saw less damage this morning
than what it did. (the damage was probably already done before I saw
it).

It is late September now. If I want to kill those grubs, is it too
late? All grub controls I can find in home depot need to be applied
between early spring and late July. Can this nematode Heterorhabditis
bacteriophora be applied this time of the year? I went to the web site
and did not find a answer there. Thanks.