Attention all Carl Spackler worshippers, underground varmint haters, and people who live with the antics of those obsessed with ridding their lawn of moles, their gardens of voles, and their life of like creatures. Here’s your chance to portray your experiences. That’s right, Sweeney’s, a St. Louis-based company that sells traps, repellants, and poisons aimed to eradicate tunneling creatures from America’s lawns is holding its third annual contest seeking “I Hate Moles Because …” submissions (essay, poem, video, cartoon).
If, like Caddyshack’s Carl Spackler (Bill Murray) your montra is “I gotta get into this dude’s pelt and crawl around for a few days,” or you’ve found yourself saying “How about a nice, cool drink, varmints?” as you stuff a hose fully loaded with water down a tunnel that has marred your perfect lawn, this is the contest for you. And, as the New York Times reports, you can even watch your nemesis on Mole Cam … REALLY!
I’ve had my fair share of run-ins with moles in the lawn. On late summer mornings you’re likely to see me taking baby steps around my front yard in bizarre patterns as I stomp down the previous night’s mole tunnels. But my larger problem is with voles – the mouse-like creatures that eat vegetation. What voles left of my crocus they rearranged in a most unkempt manner, and they’ve had some mighty good meals of my perennials (phlox, ornamental grasses, hosta, coneflowers, sedum, daisies, iris) and small shrubs (bayberry, roses, Rose of Sharon). And last year they fed huge populations of relatives on volumes of my vegetable plants (Thinking outside of the plot). I’ve tried traps, solar sound deterrents, stinky garlic and egg mixtures, castor oil pellets … all with minimal or no impact. I may have even emulated Carl now and then in one of my rants over finding an empty hole where a plant used to be. Still, I’m no match for past winners and runners-up, these people are serious! Carl would be proud.
joene's garden 
Thanks for posting!