all about voles!

Question
I've seen several q's about voles.  Maybe I can help. I now have a vole brought in by our cat when the vole was quite small, but able to eat on its own.  The weather forecast was for snow in a few days - first of the season, and we didn't know from which of the many vole colonies the little creature was raided, so we decided to keep the vole indoors.  At first I used a box with 2 in. of wood shavings (certified for pet bedding) with a heating pad under half the box, in a bathroom with a small heater set to 70 degrees.  After a few days I moved it to a big plastic bin, trying to create more of a vole-ish habitat.
I put it in a large plastic bin (30 in x 18 in x 18 in) with 4 in. of garden dirt and a 6 in. diameter rock on the bottom with 2 in. of wood shavings (cert for pet bedding) on top over half the surface and chunks of sod/grass dug from the lawn on the other.  (Unlike mice, voles don't climb or jump, so we have about 8 in of "air" to the top of the bin.)  I put a toilet paper tube and a plastic tube of the mouse/hamster cage sort inside, places the vole could hide and to imitate its underground tunnels a bit.  We put a UV light on a few hrs a day to keep the grass growing.  
In the beginning the vole didn't dig, it just snuggled down in the wood shavings and buried itself. It would run through the tubes in route to its food (food discussion follows). After a couple of weeks, the vole began to dig, big time. It created tunnels everywhere. The woodchips became completely mixed in with the dirt.  The toilet paper rolls were buried and collapsed, so I removed them.  The plastic tubing is buried, but still used as part of the vole's tunnels.  We had a great time watching the transformation, and the flying dirt as the vole dug out its own space.  We used a translucent bin, so it was almost like watching a multi-dimensional ant farm!
I experimented with food.  Our vole eats grass, including roots growing in its habitat.  Daily it also eats lots of whole-grain oats (not the "quick" variety), many greens - it devours fresh "organic spring mix" from the supermarket, parakeet seed, fruit - like a bit of strawberry, 1/4 slice of banana, a blueberry cut in half, half a grape. I put in some mouse food and a bit of alfalfa hay as well. From this diet, the vole has tripled in size.  We are growing grass now in an indoor environment since our lawn is covered in snow, so nowhere to dig up chunks of grass/sod.
Since the lifespan of a vole in the wild is 6 months, but as a pet or in a lab environment it lives up to 3 years, its unlikely we'll release the fellow - we're too attached.  We will be moving it to an even bigger bin soon.  
I hope this helps you when people inquire about voles.
I'd like to keep my email address private, if possible.  Thanks.

Answer
Hi!

Thank you so much!  You are so sweet to provide this information!  I am publishing it just as you wrote it, but with no name (or email).  I'm sure it will be a great help to anyone wanting to know about voles.  I'll forward it onto the other mouse expert as well, Cass.  

squeaks n giggles,

Natasha

(revised-- forgot to add search tags)