Why Do People Use Coffee Grounds To Deter Moles And Does It Actually Work?

Moles are so cute in cartoons, but not so much in the garden. These small, burrowing creatures might be tiny and blind, but they leave a huge mess wherever they go. Upturned lawns, ruined flower beds, and molehills that appear overnight can ruin your perfectly manicured lawn and cause chaos. No wonder gardeners and homeowners are always on the hunt for ways to keep them at bay. One mole deterrent that many people seem to believe in is coffee grounds. This would have the benefit of being easy, affordable, and humane, but does sprinkling your morning brew around the yard actually deter moles? Unfortunately, there is no evidence that this works. 

The idea is that coffee grounds emit a strong smell that moles hate. As such, people assume that sprinkling freshly brewed coffee grounds in the garden would gently usher the moles away, inconvenienced by the smell they dislike. And the idea makes sense, since moles are notoriously blind, they do use their sense of smell to help them find food and orient themselves. Naturally, you would assume that a strong scent would at the very least throw them off, if not completely push them out.

The truth is, there is no actual scientific evidence that coffee grounds can remove moles from the garden, but it's also not a hard no. While there is no scientific evidence, hearsay and anecdotal evidence are enough to convince some gardeners to try it out. Coffee grounds will cause no harm to a garden, which makes it a compelling option before moving on to more expensive, complex, or less humane solutions. 

While there is no scientific evidence that coffee grounds and other scents can deter moles, there are some gardeners who swear that it's worked for them. If you'd like to see for yourself and try it out, keep in mind a few basic common-sense tips. First of all, a few coffee grounds won't be a long-term solution for a wide-scale mole problem. You're likely not brewing enough coffee daily to cover your entire yard with enough grounds for the smell to completely infuse the ground and deter moles from the area. Instead, sprinkle coffee grounds into existing molehills and then cover them back up. For the smell to truly linger, reapply often, liberally, and especially so after it rains. 

While this unexpected use for leftover coffee grounds isn't sure to get rid of your mole problem altogether, it can have other benefits for your garden. Extermination experts say that coffee grounds can be used as natural pest control against insects, for example. By reducing the population of insects living in the soil, you're also removing potential foods for moles to eat and, therefore, making your yard less attractive to them. In addition, this strategy can also help solve common gardening issues. For example, coffee grounds may be the solution to amending the clay soil in your yard, which can be difficult to grow healthy and thriving plants in otherwise. 

So, the bottom line is that adding coffee grounds to your garden soil might not solve your mole problem, but it likely won't hurt. But if you've got a persistent mole problem on your hands, you probably will need to do a bit more than sprinkling your morning brew into your garden to solve it. 

Some of the more common ways to deal with a mole infestation require trapping, fumigating, or poisoning moles with fake worms filled with lethal chemicals. If you'd like to avoid these techniques and are looking for a more humane alternative, there are some options.

First things first, a smart way to gently ask moles to relocate is by simply removing their access to food. The reason they are coming to your yard is that they are finding tons of food to eat. Moles don't eat plants — they much prefer insects, and are especially attracted to grubs. Grubs are larvae of beetles that live in the ground and that moles can find while burrowing their tunnels through your lawn. Anything you can do to remove grubs from your yard will go a long way in reducing its attractiveness to moles.

If the issue is persistent and moles seem to come back to your backyard even as you try to remove their access to grubs, consider some more heavy-duty humane solutions like netting. The idea is to add a layer of steel or polypropylene mesh in the ground, right below the lawn, to prevent moles from coming to the surface. Eventually, grass grows through the mole mesh, which moles can't break through in order to create their infamous molehills. You can pair this method with some ultrasonic devices, which emit sound waves into the ground to disturb the moles. Of course, all of this is a bit of a serious endeavor, since you'll need to dig up and flatten your lawn, lay out the net over the soil, cover it back up, and re-seed your lawn. While this is quite the undertaking, it does have the benefit of working long-term.