The raised ridges between the holes in the top pictures look like mole tunnels rather than voles. Moles don't eat plants and don't directly damage your plants, but their tunneling will disrupt the roots and often kill plants. Voles are smaller, eat vegetable matter, and kill plants. If you cut a apple, sweet potato, etc in half and leave it overnight, you will find out which one you have. Moles will ignore the bait, and voles will eat it. If it almost impossible to have both, because moles will kill and eat voles. It is not too important which one, because castor oil with get rid of both. There are organic controls made from castor beans that are noxious to both. For some reason they both hate castor oil, even small amounts in the soil will run them off. If you have a small garden area you want to clear of them, you can start with pouring a few tablespoon of castor oil down each of the holes. You can mix a bottle of castor oil with warm water and a squirt of dish detergent. Take this mixture and pour the mixture around your garden with a watering can or hose spray attachment. This will keep them away for about a month. There are pellets that release the castor oil slowly over time that are effective for larger areas and longer term control. It is very hard to kill all of them, but it is not too difficult to make an area noxious enough that they move elsewhere, such as your neighbors' yards. If you are dealing with a larger area, such as a lawn, it is best to start on one side and work your way gradually across with application of the castor oil or pellets each few days to a new area. The idea is to sort of "herd" them somewhere else, such as a vacant lot, wooded area, or your least favorite neighbor's yard.

I've been looking at 5am & evening. Either its happening in the middle of the night or during the day when I'm not home. The damage is extensive but random as to plant type and location in the garden (it's 100ft long) and since the pests aren't present on the leaves, that's why I considered beetles as my primary suspect. They can come & go irregardless of time of day.

Ahhhh, the lazy part - been there, do that too! Dance With Me - I've heard it is hard so I never got it. Earth Angel - grows like a weed, love it. Ice Age Trail - I had it, got it as a young TC and grew it in a pot but it didn't survive this spring. I've seen pics of IAT purchased from Jim's Hosta that were big and gorgeous. It also is a streaker plant and will produce other streaked plants from seed. If you get it, save me some seeds. Touch of Class - gorgeous, don't have it but have one of the look alikes named Dream Weaver. It does very well here and intro'd by Kevin Walleck, our current AHS prez. Jewel of the Nile - another KW intro and it grows like a weed here. Paradigm - a classic, yes to it. Liberty - a new one for me last fall. It almost didn't come back and when it did was puny. I dug it up and potted it - the leaf is 1" and probably won't make it back next year. I replaced it, it has only produced one new leaf - I hope it comes back next spring. Liberty is a sport, probably tetraploid of Sagae. I highly recommend Sagae for the look, the margin just isn't as wide. I don't have any of the others and have heard nothing about them. For a balanced hosta garden, make sure you bring in solid colors to offset the patterned cultivars. I didn't because I love all the same type. I then had to go back and bring in some solids and to move things around to please the eye. It is the same as the daylily addiction - we bring in our favorite colors, look around and it becomes blah, so we then bring in other colors to liven things up. Some good blues in different sizes I recommend - Abiqua Drinking Gouard or Love Pat - great color, upright growing. Small blues that hold their color late into the season - Blue Jay and Fragrant Blue. Dark greens - Fried Green Tomatoes, a couple of Lakeside plants that I can't remember right now. If you want big, try some of the sports from Sum and Substance - Sum It Up, Bottom Line and Sum of All. Big, fast growing, all with edges but not "clashy" edges. They are all dark green. Other must haves - June, Paul's Glory or St. Paul. I know you don't like the skinny leaves but consider Ginsu Knife, has a slight light margin but lots of rippling on the edge, Marilyn Monroe, lighter green with ripples and Queen of the Seas, big blue with ripples. These offset the big round leaves that I love. For golds, Choo Choo Train, Sweet Sunshine, I think, hybridized by Solberg and a couple more Lakesides I can't remember, really make the shady areas pop. Have fun as another addiction starts. Could I also interest you in orchids?????????? Brooke

Thanks floral! I guess I just called it a seedling because it's a young plant early in the spring :-/ There's no spines on it, and for the most part still looks exactly the same, e.g., it's not getting taller - yet. Maybe it'll bloom later this summer; if so, I'll update a picture to help identification.