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Pocket gophers love garden bulbs and veggies

CORVALLIS - Pocket gophers are trouble for lawns and gardens. These energetic rodents have the annoying habit of dining on vegetables and flower bulbs. They can prune the roots and girdle the trunks of small shrubs and trees as well.

The first step in figuring out what to do about your burrowing garden pests is to identify the perpetrators, explained Dan Edge, wildlife specialist with the Oregon State University Extension Service.

The most likely types of burrowing animals that damage the lawn and garden are moles, voles (meadow mice) and pocket gophers.

Pocket gophers, voles and moles are not often seen above ground, so they must usually be identified by their handiwork - fresh mounds and burrows in the soil.

Gopher burrows extend side tunnels to the surface from deeper main tunnels. They push up soil in flattened or fan-shaped mounds. The mounds vary from 12 to 24 inches in diameter and are six or more inches high.

After pushing soil out their tunnels, gophers plug the surface opening, leaving a noticeable dent or plug at one end of a freshly excavated pile of soil. The entire side tunnel may be back-filled to the main tunnel.

Moles, on the other hand, periodically excavate soil from the same hole, building up volcano-like mounds that are higher than gopher mounds. Unlike a gopher mound, no hole is evident on the side of a mole mound. Voles have no mounds at the entrance of their open burrows.

Gopher mounds tend to be clumped in tight groups. Mole mounds tend to be spaced in a line as single mounds. Voles often make runways above the surface of the ground in tall grass or sedges.

If you are lucky enough to catch a glimpse of a pocket gopher, you will see a small stout rodent, 5 to 12 inches long. They have short, sparsely-haired tails and large fur-lined cheek pouches or pockets, that give the animal its name.

Though you may notice dozens of holes in your lawn and garden, odds are, it represents the labor of only one busy gopher. A single animal may excavate as much as 800 feet of tunnel in a network covering an acre or more, said Edge.

Solitary by nature, pocket gophers get together only to breed and when the female is rearing her young. Each animal fiercely defends its own living area and burrow system.

Gophers have many natural enemies including dogs, cats, hawks, owls, foxes, coyotes, badgers, weasels and snakes. The gopher usually keeps its burrow system tightly closed to keep out such intruders.

They do not hibernate. When snow covers the ground, they come up to the ground to tunnel in the snow and girdle or clip trees and shrubs above ground level. Young are born in April and May. Litters average five to eight young. The young mature quickly. By six weeks of age, they are on their own, moving out to establish new territories, conquering new lawns and gardens.

What can you do if pocket gophers are causing a problem on your property? They may be controlled by tilling, flooding or by proper use of traps and poison baits, or by a combination of methods, said Edge.

In the "old" days, farmers repeatedly flooded gopher-infested hay and grain crops in the early summer. This forced pocket gophers to leave their burrow systems or drown. But re-invasion after the floods by gophers is often a problem.

Studies have indicated that pocket gopher damage can be reduced by deeply tilling the soil, disrupting their burrow systems.

Many homeowners find baiting with properly prepared commercial baits to be quicker, easier and more effective than trapping, flooding, or tilling.

To learn more about pocket gopher control, Controlling pocket gopher damage to agricultural crops, EC 1117. visit our on-line catalog. Our publications and video catalog at: http://extension.oregonstate.edu/catalog shows which publications are available on the Web and which can be ordered as printed publications.

By: Carol Savonen
Source: Dan Edge

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