# Ground hog tunnels and horse arena, should I be concerned?



## jaydee (May 10, 2012)

We had to remove one from our riding arena - they don't go deep enough to not risk collapse under regular pressure.
You don't need a big machine to dig them out - hire one from a local company if you don't have one and then fill the cavity with stone and put the soil/sand back on top.
'Our' woodchuck decided to up and move when we did it, if not you need to look at ways to deter them. They aren't supposed to like strong smells so experiment with things like bleach, moth balls, garlic etc if you can't trap them and relocate


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## Nortman (Oct 11, 2019)

Yeah, some small animals as rats or groundhog could create an annoying problem and it is very hard to fight with them. They all are attracted by a lot of food from the floor which is in free accessibility. The only solution to get rid of this invasion of gnawers helped me. I have rebuilt the horse arena and made a special design for the horse cases. A local company helped me a lot and made the perfect arena which looks nice and have more benefits and is very easy to clean up and comfortable to ride there on bad weather.


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## walkinthewalk (Jul 23, 2008)

You need to get rid of the ground hogs, one way or another.

There's more than one groundhog -- they don't live alone. They multiply which means underground groundhog condominiums.

I have seen cattle having to be destroyed with broken legs from falling in a groundhog hole.

I have seen tires on farm equipment fall into the earth, when the ground is soft, from ground hog excavation.

They are the bane of a farmer's existence when they move into a field -- we used to hire someone to sit on a rock for a day and shoot them. Better they bite the bullet than the cattle or the horses.

They are cute little things until they cost a farmer a piece of livestock


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## weeedlady (Jul 19, 2014)

I was once able to make a ground hog move out by constantly dumping my used cat litter down his numerous holes.


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## Kaifyre (Jun 16, 2016)

I agree with @walkinthewalk - pay some sharpshooting high school or college kid to sit out there and snipe 'em, or do it yourself. I've found that the majority of those no kill traps are a waste of time, and even the kill traps leave them to suffer a lot. A bullet at least is a quick end. DON'T catch and release, that's just foisting this problem off onto someone else. I would definitely take care of the problem as soon as you can. My neighbors in Nevada lost a horse to a groundhog hole, after he snapped his leg and bled out. It wasn't quick, and they didn't find him until long after he'd passed. It was heartbreaking. Groundhogs don't engender the kind of loathing in me that prairie dogs do (don't even get me started on those vermin), but they're almost as bad. 

-- Kai


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