It's hard to say without pics but based on the description I'm guessing it's a meadow vole. They're really common and leave little piles of scat around. They also eat more green vegetation, thus the green droppings, than most other rodents.

Do they look like this?
http://www.pbase.com/laroseforest/image/122088106
and
http://www.outwitcritters.com/images/voles/vole-scat.jpg

Voles often create little tunnels through the grass and under the snow so look for those. I don't think peanuts will trap them. When I trap small rodents (I've actually do this for a living; wildlife biologist) we would use a mixture of rolled oats and peanut butter. The oats attract the grain eaters and the peanut butter the protein eats plus it helps hold the oats together and stick them to the trap. Place the traps in the tunnels if you can find them or near where you saw the tracks.

To be honest though trapping outdoors isn't going to do a whole lot of good. I can pretty much assure you that there are hundreds of little rodents around your neighborhood. If you kill the ones in your yard the ones in your neighbors yard will still have enough babies to repopulate your yard in a few weeks.

Voles it is. Eeeew.

Thanks!

Voles are the worst pest by far, they can decimate your trees & shrubs
by eating the bark, ...they do this all winter under the snow.
I never have problems here at home, [town] but at the acreage not so, every couple of years or so I have to depopulate them, [winter only] with bait stations, a anticoagulant mouse bait, I do this inside a plastic plant pot, put another one on top of this bait, mouse can go in by the drain hole.
I don't like doing this....I'm worried a owl can get second poisoning.
My neighbor has 3 cats cleaning up a bit but not enough.

Maybe I could rent your neighbour's cats =:)

There's a lot of droppings around the rose bushes, a new clematis, a new willow, and right in the middle of the lawn. I think I'll lose it if they've damaged the junipers, amur maple, and lilac.

Sure glad we don't have little children to play in the yard anymore.

I imagine a lot of rodents have been displaced by all the farmer's fields that were so flooded last year. Eeeew !

I've heard of the seven year itch before but I think moles have a seven year population explosion. The fields around here look like they have been plowed! The moles/voles completely girdled a maple, a bur oak, lilacs (they do grow back but the trees won't), a viburnum and 'tasted' several other shrubs. I did put down some mouse bait in the tracks, put a board over it and weighed it down with a brick. We have 2 dogs so that keeps them safe. Think I may have gotten a few moles anyway. I also found several beheaded ones in the hosta garden so I think the resident hawk owl (had to look that one up) is busy at work. I find the decapitated body first and then the head. Case for CSI? Marg

Oh Marg, you must have a stronger stomach than I do.

Just seeing all the spots where there's blobs of vole poop, plus the holes they've dug at the edges of my brick bed, and the mess they've made of the lawn, make me think my plans are going to change this gardening season. =:(

There's still too much snow around the trees to see what damage they may have done there.

One thing I know is worse then vole poop...finding a big pile of bear poop right of the corner of the deck where you sit and watch the stars at night.

Voles did damage to some of my small shrubs too. Had a big moose in the front yard this morning but at least he did not nibble on anything.

LOL freezengirl. I'd take the bear poop over piles of moose poop. Hummm...which would do more damage to a garden? Bears at least don't tend to care about the garden itself. They sure like the compost and trash though.

My cat does a good job of keeping rodents down for me. I just wish he didn't feel the need to bring the bodies back inside as a present. Although the bodies are better then when he brings them inside alive. He does this pretty often. I think he just likes playing with them...what is better than a toy the moves and squeaks on it's own? He does usually catch and eventually kill it but I've seen him carrying around mice alive just to drop them and then chase after them. He usually does this in the middle of the night and in our bedroom for some reason. When we're woken up by the cat pouncing and running like crazy or trying to fit his whole body under our dresser it usually means he found himself a live toy.

As for vole damage and trees. Get some small mesh hardware cloth and wrap it around the trunks of the trees. It'll keep the voles (and bunnies) from girdling them. Although they usually only do this in the winter, they tunnel under the snow and eat the bark as a winter food source. Once the grass and other plants greens up they prefer that. They likely won't bother the shrubs and trees again until next winter.

Thanks for the tip about the wire mesh around the trees. We noticed when we were going up the driveway that the hillside along it was completely riddled with holes. I have never seen anything like it before. It looked like someone had taken an oversized cane end and puntured into the hillside every square foot or so. I had been looking at the way the native grasses, Pushki and wild ferns form big mounds of dead vegetation around here and thinking it must be a real haven for rodents. This is our first winter in Alaska so we are still learning about our new home.

I discovered yesterday what the voles have been eating. My rose bushes. There's more chew marks on some of the canes than there is anything else.

Although it's still too muddy to get close enough, it appears they left the junipers alone, as well as the lilac and the amur maple. They also didn't touch the two schubert chokecherries, but I would have preferred they damage those instead of anything else.

I'll have to get some wire mesh for next year. However, if I could surround the place with closely knit barb wire to keep out the voles, rabbit and the new neighbours, I would, LOL !