As the ground cools and gardens quieten down for the year, two very different pests start making their presence felt across South Nottinghamshire. In Clifton and Ruddington, and over in Radcliffe on Trent, Cotgrave and Keyworth, we’re seeing the usual autumn pattern repeat itself: molehills appearing overnight on lawns and playing fields, and rats starting to look for a warm, dry place to spend the colder months.
Molehills Popping Up in Ruddington and Cotgrave
Moles don’t hibernate, but their feeding habits change noticeably as the weather turns. Earthworms and grubs move deeper into the soil as the surface cools, so moles tunnel harder and closer to the surface to keep finding food — which is exactly when those fresh, crumbly mounds start appearing on lawns, allotments and verges.
We’re keeping a particular eye on the open grassland around Ruddington’s recreation ground and the fringes of Rushcliffe Country Park, where the softer, well-drained soil makes for easy tunnelling. Cotgrave is another hotspot this time of year — the reclaimed grassland around Cotgrave Country Park, built on the old colliery site, has exactly the loose, worm-rich ground moles favour, and we regularly get called out to gardens backing onto it. Keyworth’s allotments and larger rear gardens see similar activity once the first proper cold spell hits.
A molehill or two is mostly cosmetic, but a run of them across a lawn, sports pitch or allotment bed can undermine root systems, create trip hazards, and make a real mess of ground that’s been carefully maintained all year.
Rats Moving Indoors as Temperatures Drop
At the same time, rats are doing their own version of battening down for winter — and that usually means moving closer to, or straight into, our homes and outbuildings. In Clifton, we see this most along the riverside path near Clifton Bridge and in the older terraced streets further into the estate, where Victorian-era brickwork often has gaps around pipework and airbricks that a rat can exploit with very little effort. Radcliffe on Trent has its own version of the problem around the allotments and older properties near Shelford Road, where sheds and compost heaps give rats cover right up to the back door.
Signs to look out for include droppings (dark, pellet-shaped, often found along skirting boards or in cupboards), gnaw marks on skirting, door frames or stored food packaging, greasy smear marks where rats repeatedly brush against the same surface, and scratching noises from lofts, under floors or behind kitchen units — usually most audible at night.
The risks go well beyond the unpleasantness of having rats in the house. They contaminate food and surfaces, and their constant need to gnaw means they’ll happily chew through electrical cabling, which is a genuine fire risk in lofts and wall cavities.
Mole or Rat? Telling the Signs Apart
- Molehills are mounds of loose, finely crumbled soil with no visible entrance hole, usually appearing in rows or clusters across open lawn, pasture or allotment ground.
- Rat burrows are open holes, often at the base of a wall, fence line, shed or compost heap, with a smoothed, compacted entrance from repeated use rather than loose soil.
- Mole activity is confined to open ground — you won’t find moles indoors or in outbuildings.
- Rat activity is just as likely to show up indoors — in lofts, under decking, in airing cupboards or behind kitchen appliances — as it is outside.
What You Can Do
For rats, the most effective long-term fix is proofing: sealing gaps around pipework and airbricks with a proper rodent-proof material, fitting a brush strip or metal kick plate to ill-fitting shed and garage doors, keeping bird feed and compost in secured containers, and clearing overgrown ground cover away from the base of walls. For moles, trapping or professional mole control is really the only reliable way to clear an established run — the mounds themselves are just the visible tip of a tunnel network that can extend much further than it looks.
If you’re in Clifton, Ruddington, Radcliffe on Trent, Cotgrave, Keyworth or anywhere else across the Nottingham area and you’re seeing molehills appearing or signs of rats moving in for the winter, get in touch with NestBusters for a proper inspection and a plan to deal with it properly rather than just treating the symptoms. Call us on 0742 984 9483 or visit nottinghampest.co.uk to find out more.
