Woodchucks are the major hole-digging mammals over much of eastern North America, and in some places in the west. All sorts of animals are able to thrive because of the shelter supplied by woodchuck holes. The list includes a wide variety of fur and game animals, some of which destroy huge quantities of farm pests, such as rats, mice and insects. Skunks, raccoons, foxes, rabbits, and snakes all take shelter in woodchuck holes.

Many farmers consider woodchucks to be nuisance animals, because of the vegetation that they eat, and because the piles of earth that they throw up while digging interfere with haymaking. Woodchucks do compete on a small scale with farmers’ cattle for food and occasionally get into people’s vegetable gardens. But the view that woodchucks are therefore pests, to be exterminated where possible, is nearly always a short-sighted one which overlooks the benefits of having the animals about.

A listener of my radio show told me that after trying everything to get rid of moles, gophers and groundhogs, he planted jalapeno peppers within 4 inches of where these rodents were invading. Voila, they ran for cover after taking a test of these hot veggies.

snakes all take shelter in woodchuck holes

Researchers have noted that groundhogs are THE most fastidious of underground creatures, constantly digging new latrines and sealing off old ones to keep their runs ‘Martha Stewart fresh’. So obtain some used kitty litter—preferably from a litter box that went too long between changes—scoop out and properly dispose of the solid waste, and then pour the ammonia-rich remainder into that main entrance hole. The groundhog’s reaction will be the same as if someone had dumped a truckload of the stuff into your living room: “Honey—we’ll never get this place clean! We have to move.”

their extensive burrowing can undermine the integrity of homes and other structures; those burrows break untold numbers of legs each year—often badly (the design of the hole ‘catches’ the legs of unwary humans and livestock in such a way that it tends to cause exceptionally nasty breaks); and the large creatures have been known to tear into children and pets with a surprising viciousness.