Voles

As Jasper Carrot said "Blow there bloody heads off" (he was talking about moles)
Aww voles are sweet little things, thought they ate worms etc, didn't know they were a pest.

I thought voles lived mostly in water and that they are quite rare these days?

You are thinking of water Voles, which do live in water and are rare. Filed voles are what Nannyben61 has I suspect. I realize I was thinking about shrews when i said about eating worms, voles are vegetarian.

Ratty of The Wind in the willows was a water vole. They are scarce these days partly because there is less vegetation along stream and river banks and partly because they get caught by mink. Otters can chase them through the water to catch them, but are too big to follow them in if they get as far as their burrow in the bank. Mink are slimmer, so they go up the burrow to the nest and eat the whole family.

There is a project to reintroduce them to some areas

Put moth balls down the holes, deters moles too!

I thought shrews and voles were the same creature

Common shrews are tiny and have long pointed noses.

I haven't seen a shrew for about 25 years, the last one was 'discovered ' in welly boot by Young DD's bare foot......complete with four tiddly babies. You would have heard the screams a mile away!

Unfortunately our cat could find them

We have mole voles in France- campagnol taupe,and what a nuisance they're causing!

My cats catch shrews too. Apparently they don't eat them, because they have a very bitter taste.

Although, how some researcher discovered that I can only imagine.....

Phoenix
LoopyLou, who's screams, the human or the voles?

One of our cats used to catch shrews all the time and let them loose in the kitchen, they do have long whiffley noses, quite cute, a bit like Clangers.