How do we find and control mole crickets in our HOA's common turf in Florida or Texas?

By OurHOA · General information · Revised October 29, 2026

How an HOA board confirms mole crickets with a soap flush, treats young nymphs in early summer and cuts lighting and watering that draw them to common turf.

Part of the HOA board handbook: vendors, projects and upkeep.

The short answer

If a strip of common grass looks drought-stricken even though the sprinklers run, and the soil feels spongy with raised tunnels, suspect mole crickets. In Florida, three non-native species do the damage: the tawny, southern and shortwinged mole crickets. In Texas, it is mostly the southern mole cricket, with the tawny in the Houston area east to Louisiana. The board's plan has three parts. Confirm them with a soap flush before anyone sprays. Treat in late spring and early summer, when the nymphs are small, instead of in August, when the damage shows and the crickets are nearly grown. Then change the things that draw adults to your turf in the first place: lights at dusk and wet soil during egg laying. Colorado boards can skip this one. The UF/IFAS range maps put the pest species along the Gulf and southern Atlantic coasts and as far west as central Texas. This is general education. Pesticide labels, state licensing law and your governing documents decide what your association may do.

Know the signs and where to look

UF/IFAS says mole crickets tunnel in the top ten inches of soil and feed on roots, so grass loosens, takes up less water and thins into dead patches. Ridged tunnels you can feel underfoot are the giveaway. So are armadillos and raccoons digging in the same area, because both eat mole crickets. The grass type matters. UF/IFAS lists bahiagrass, bermudagrass and seashore paspalum as the most susceptible. Centipedegrass, St. Augustinegrass and zoysiagrass are injured least often. Texas A&M AgriLife says bermudagrass is the most common target in Texas, and sand-based sports fields suffer most because the crickets tunnel through them easily. If your HOA has bahia along a retention pond or a bermuda ball field, start there. Adults fly at dusk for one to two hours and are drawn to light, especially ultraviolet and mercury vapor lamps. UF/IFAS says a new infestation is often centered near outdoor lights and sprinkler heads, because females burrow into the moist soil nearby to mate and lay eggs. Check the turf under pool lights, entrance monument lights and parking lot poles first. Not every mole cricket is a pest. UF/IFAS says the native species has four claws on each digging foreleg, and the pest species have two.

Run a soap flush and count

This takes a volunteer, a bucket and a few minutes. The soil has to be moist, so do it the morning after irrigation or rain. The UF/IFAS Mole Cricket IPM Guide gives this method: 1. Mix 3/4 ounce (1.5 tablespoons) of liquid dish soap into 1 gallon of water. 2. Mark a 2-by-2-foot square where you suspect activity. 3. Pour the solution evenly over the square. 4. Watch for 3 minutes and count every mole cricket that comes up. Texas A&M uses 1 tablespoon of lemon-scented dish detergent per gallon. Either works. Flush several squares across the suspect area. Write down the date, the spot, the count and the size of the crickets. A quarter-inch cricket is a young nymph. One about 1 1/4 inches long is an adult, per Texas A&M. Keep a site map of every square that turned up crickets. UF/IFAS says areas infested once tend to be infested again, so next year's scouting starts on that map.

Set the trigger and the calendar

Use the published numbers as the board's trigger and put them in the landscape contract, so no one sells a treatment without a count. UF/IFAS says control is justified in many cases when two or more mole crickets surface from a 4-square-foot flush, and it calls 2 to 4 adults per 4 square feet a general upper limit for turf. A sports field may warrant a lower trigger than a roadside buffer. Timing matters more than the product. Texas A&M says the worst damage comes in late summer and early fall as the nymphs near maturity, but treatment at that stage is difficult, so treat early while they are small. UF/IFAS says the same: small nymphs in summer are more susceptible to insecticides than the large nymphs of late summer and fall. The season, from the two extension guides: - Tawny mole cricket in Florida: peak flight March to May, a smaller fall flight, eggs hatching April to June, nymphs maturing over about five months. - Southern mole cricket in Florida: peak flight April to June and a minor flight around November. South Florida gets a second major flight in July and two generations a year. - Texas: eggs from April in south Texas and from June or July in north Texas. Texas A&M says to scout and treat May through July. UF/IFAS Extension in South Florida notes the crickets are active year-round and do the most visible damage in spring and from late August to early October, when they are mostly adults. By then the crickets are large and harder to kill. Flag the spots and come back to them in May.

Change the lights and the watering

These cost little and help every year. Lights. UF/IFAS recommends turning lights off from sunset to well past dark during months of peak flight. Where lights must stay on for safety, use yellow bulbs or filters, which draw fewer crickets. Ask the board member who handles amenities to put a timer change on the calendar for March through June. Our guide on lighting HOA walking paths covers fixture choices if you are replacing lights anyway. Water. UF/IFAS says females lay more eggs in irrigated soil than in dry soil, egg survival drops in drought, and the crickets need moist soil. It recommends cutting back watering in winter. Don't parch the turf in summer to fight them, because stressed grass suffers more. Fix overspray and broken heads that keep a corner soggy. Insecticides work better when applied after irrigation brings the crickets near the surface. Grass choice. When you resod a damaged bahia or bermuda area that does not need to be a playing surface, consider a less susceptible grass such as zoysia or centipede.

Give the natural enemies room

Florida has three South American natural enemies of pest mole crickets that UF/IFAS released: the Larra wasp, the Brazilian red-eyed fly and a nematode, Steinernema scapterisci. UF/IFAS says all three are now present in Florida but none is sold commercially, so the board cannot buy them. It can keep them around. The Larra wasp is black with a red abdomen. It attacks only pest mole crickets and does not sting people. Adults need nectar. UF/IFAS names shrubby false buttonweed, also called larraflower, as the preferred source, with white pentas and partridge pea as alternatives. The wasps forage at least 200 yards from those plants. Larraflower can spread, so plant it where it can be contained. In north Florida the wasps are active from late April until the first hard frost. Blanket insecticide programs work against this. UF/IFAS points to golf courses that treat fairways, greens and tees and leave the roughs alone to keep beneficial insects alive. Do the same: treat the flushed hot spots and leave the rest.

Treat with a licensed contractor

When counts beat the trigger in late spring or early summer, the contractor should spot treat the mapped areas with a product labeled for mole crickets on turf. Texas A&M lists bifenthrin, fipronil, indoxacarb and thiamethoxam as effective active ingredients. UF/IFAS adds that applications should rotate between insecticide groups to slow resistance. Labels change, so the label sets the rate, the watering-in and any re-entry time. Florida. Section 482.071 of the Florida Statutes makes it unlawful to run a pest control business without a license from the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. The limited landscape certificate in section 482.156 covers ornamental plants and beds, not lawn insects. Ask whether your landscaper's license covers turf, or hire a licensed lawn and ornamental company. Texas. Occupations Code section 1951.003(a)(1)(B) treats identifying or treating pests of plantings in a park or next to a residence for pay as structural pest control. Section 1951.301 requires a business license from the Texas Department of Agriculture. Get the license number before the work starts. Require the invoice to list the active ingredient, area and date.

A season plan, an owner notice and a motion

Sample year for a Florida or south Texas HOA: - February: review last year's flush map. Plant or refresh the nectar bed. - March to June: lights on timers or yellow bulbs at pools, monuments and parking areas. - May: flush the mapped spots and any new thin areas. Count and log. - Late May to early July: if counts meet the trigger, spot treat after irrigation. - Two to three weeks after treatment: flush the same squares again. - August to October: note where damage shows and add it to the map. Repair turf, but hold spraying for next spring unless the contractor finds small nymphs. - November to February: reduce irrigation run times. Owner notice: "Mole crickets are tunneling under the common grass at [locations]. On [date], a licensed contractor will treat those areas only. Please keep children and pets off the marked areas until the signs come down. From March through June we will dim or switch off some common area lights at dusk, because the adults fly to them to lay eggs." Sample motion: "Move that the board adopt a mole cricket plan: soap flush counts in May, spot treatment by a licensed contractor only where counts reach 2 or more per 4 square feet, lighting changes during the spring flight, and a site map kept with the grounds records." The common mistakes are spraying adults in the fall, treating the whole property on a schedule, and never checking whether the treatment worked. If armadillos are part of the problem, our guide on armadillos digging up common areas covers that side.

Sources

These guides are general education for HOA boards and residents, not legal, tax, or financial advice. Rules vary by state and by your community's governing documents - check with a professional for your situation.

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