We discovered this past spring that we had an armadillo problem around the farm and we were determined to find out how to get rid of them.
Each evening, Annabelle and Ranger would bark and bark and bark and when we would look out onto the runway with a light we’d notice the armadillo that she was determined to keep away from the house.
We’d also find soft spots when we’d walk across the fields and then, we’d find small holes here and there. In the pastures is one thing since we aren’t keeping cattle or anything that would step in the holes and get hurt, but we warned everyone if they went walking in the pastures to pay attention to where they stepped. But the runway is something different entirely.
Since small aircraft routinely take off and land on our grass strip, it is one of the areas of the farm that my husband pays even closer attention to make sure that it is well-maintained. Finding that armadillo were making themselves at home and making a mess, was not something he wanted to find.
We had person after person come check out the fields to give us advice on how to deter the armadillo as well as repair the damage. Finally, our local extension agent recommended how to get rid of grub worms on the runway. He knew we had to get rid of the grubs that the armadillo were feeding on since regardless of anything else we did, if we didn’t get rid of what was attracting the armadillos then all other effort was fruitless.
Grub worms aren’t actually worms at all. They are the larvae of Japanese beetles and they wreck havoc in your lawn, garden, and anywhere else they may live. Japanese beetles lay their eggs in the late spring or early summer, but the cycle is continual, especially in our warm climate. We chose to use an organic material to kill the grub worms on the runway. There are faster acting chemicals on the market, but we always like to use organic methods when available.
We also had to fill the holes made by the armadillo. You can see in the last and next photo where my husband filled each of the holes with sand in the spring. We had six tons of sand delivered to the farm and last spring we went through over four tons of it, filling each of the holes using an old coffee can as our scoop. We went through all that sand scoop by scoop.
Annabelle kept an eye out for us as we worked, making sure those pesky armadillo weren’t anywhere around! Ha!
Now that fall has arrived, it’s time to treat areas of the runway again with additional grub worm killer any more filling holes we find. I understand from our extension agent that this will be something we’ll need to do each spring and fall for a while until we know that we’ve gotten rid of all the little buggers.
Annabelle’s just happy those pesky armadillos aren’t hanging out like they used to in the spring, but believe me, she’ll let us know if they come back!
