Need help with pocket goper problem

[Questor]

It's hard to get good information on dealing effectively with a pocket gopher infestation. Can you give me some good tips that have worked for you?

One thing that definitely didn't work was that we took a live and let live approach to allowing a few to live in our yard. That was a mistake. We should have gone on the offensive at the moment we first detected them. They've really gotten out of hand. We've tried a couple of different trap designs but they seem to be able to avoid being caught by them.

[magooch]

Hire a coyote.

[Questor]

We tried that. It didn't work. Cats, dogs, and raptors are ineffective too. The problem is that the pests are subterranean.

[jh45gun]

Well unless they have gotten smarter over the years which I doubt this always worked for me when I was a kid. where the mound is walk around it pressing the ground with your heel and where the tunnel is will cave in slightly. Some use a steel rod and probe the ground around the mound looking for the tunnel also either way will work. Do this about a foot away from the mound like I said. Dig a hole large enough to set a size one or 1.5  flat spring trap ( Muskrat size) in the hole setting it in the tunnel way so the pan is level with the tunnel and stake the chain outside the hole. Cover the hole with a board or any thing else that will block out the light and put a weight on it. Cover the edges with dirt so no sunlight will get in. I caught many gophers this way when I was a kid. There was a bounty on them and that is how we made money to buy BB's for our BB guns and later 22 shells.  I would suppose a conibear trap used the same way would work just as well of not better when I was a kid the regular leg hold traps were all that was available to me. They worked fine. 

[jh45gun]

Forgot to add I always made a square hole big enough for the trap to fit and I made sure the bottom of the hole was flat to set the trap and set the trap level with the tunnel.

[Questor]

jh45gun:

Thanks. I think I've got a bunch of well edj-uh-muh-kated gophers in my yard because I'm doing exactly what you said and they are working around the traps. Maybe I need a bigger board because they are filling in the hole that I have dug. Perhaps they are getting some light or drafts and that is alerting them to fill in the hole. I can't think of what else it can be. I'm even wearing vinyl gloves to keep my scent off the traps.

When you were trapping them, did they ever fill in the holes?

[powderman]

There was a bit on the news the other night about folks in the prairie dog business. They put a hose in the hole and acrually sucked them out. They sell them as pets.
Years ago my cousin and I used to fill rat holes with water, then shoot them as they came out. One of the surest ways was to hook a hose on the trucks exhaust pipe and gas them, very effective. You might say they buried their own bodies. We also used to pour gasoline in the hole and let it set for 5-10 min and lit it. Big boom, did that on groundhogs and was very effective. POWDERMAN. 

[rockbilly]

I had the same problem with ground squirrels.  I used a poison made of grain treated with arsenic.  It did the job.  The only problem,. if you have dogs, you have to watch them to prevent them from eating the dead squirrels.  I also used M-80 firecrackers.  I would light the firecracker and drop it into the hole, my son would put a 2x12 about three feet long over the hole and stand on it.  I still see one occasionally in the field behind my house, but haven't seen them in the yard lately.

If you use the poison grain try to keep it below ground, or cover it so the birds won't get into it.  Otherwise, you may poison some of the neighborhood dogs and cats.

[Questor]

TM7:

They're actually different animals, but are often trapped using the same kinds of traps. The gophers are hideously ugly herbivores and are especially fond of destroying perennial gardens that I worked years to make pretty and my asparagus patches that took years to establish. They also like to deface the lawn I'd rather not spend more time that I have to in maintaining because I'd rather be shooting or fishing.

I'm using some of those Giant Destroyers (which by the way are a variation on black powder if you read the label) and some gopher traps. So far they seem to be able to withstand or evade both.

Yesterday I used one of the Giant Destroyers at a spot that I call The Alamo because it's a real stronghold of big gophers that I've been able to bait  but not catch. This is a real massive honey hole for active gophers. I was absoloutely convinced that I would have killed them with the smoke, but this morning I checked it and found signs of vigorous activity since yesterday!!! The buggers must have scuba gear!

I feel like Wile E. Coyote chasing the road runner.  I wonder of those traps are made by Acme.

[oldandslow]

Questor, I know what you are talking about. I've been fighting these things for years and years and they always come back. One year the county agent sent me some information from the University of NM on how to poison them . Sometimes it will get one and sometimes they just ignore the poisoned grain. I' tried drowning them with out any luck, running exhaust in the hole without any luck, even tried a Mole-X and that thing sure didn't work. Once in a while I get one with poisoned grain and once in a while one with a trap. I occasionally catch one cleaning out his hole and get him with a .22. Last one I got with a twenty guage.

Twice in the last two years I used my Chevy HD Duramax pickup. Each time we had a really good rain and I just drove back and forth over the dens and caved them in. No gophers for a few months. We don't get enough rain to do this very often.

If you stuff the dead gopher back down the hole and cover him up they seem to stay away a little longer. They are still like the cat, they come back.

[unspellable]

You need a gopher snake.

They are designed to deal with this sort of problem.

[Questor]

Unspellable:

Don't laugh. I seriously considered trapping a few rattlers on my next trip to South Dakota badlands.

[jh45gun]

No never had any problems with them filling in my holes. I never even bothered with gloves either I just made sure the trap was level with the bottom of the tunnel and used a large board piece of tin or what ever but made sure it covered the hole well and then I used some of the hole dirt to cover the board well. to keep it in place and so no light or air would get in.  I know drownding them does not work never tried poison.  Trapping alwys worked for me. TM7 Pocket Gophers are about the size of a Large Rat. Like most rodents they have large buck teeth and long claws for digging.

[gdolby]

Good day gentleman, I work on a farm and we have about 180 acres of alfalfa hay. The gophers get in there and kill it by eating the roots. The method that we have found works the best is with poison grain as suggested. Take a steel rod and poke around and you can hit the tunnels pretty easy but keep working until you hit a spot that goes down at least a foot if not more. You have found the den. Put a few tablespoons of grain there, flatten the mound and watch for it to appear again. most times it wont. If it does dose again. Have a goodun........Bill

[chuckles]

I've dealt with major gopher problems for years in Agriculture in California. The only problem I ever had with the poison grain was that it would sprout and become a weed problem on it's own. Best results are with the  Mcabee traps. They are the ones with the two opposing pinchers that kill them when they are pushing down their run. They are the best. When I was a younger guy, I once killed one with my Enfield Rifle with my Wilkinson 17" bayonet. I saw it pushing dirt up, got the rifle, fixed the bayonet and charged. Skewered that little sucker then the cat finished it off. LOL

[billy_56081]

THe simplest trap to use is a killer trap generally sold at a fleet farm type store. Simply dig out the opening at the mound set the trap in the entrance and recover the hole leaving a slight hole for just a little light to get in. The gopher will push dirt in front of him to close the hole and the trap will kill him. Also check around there may be a bounty on them. We get $2 each here in southern mn.

[popgun]

 I've used the method Powderman mentioned, using the exhaust gas from my pickup through a flexible hose into the tunnel. Let it run for about ten minutes. Nothing dramatic, but it works.

[Swamp Fox]

You might as well have a bit of fun...

http://www.rodexsalesandservice.com/action.html

[alsaqr]

Get some of those big chunks of bubble gum, something like Double Bubble.  Leave it lying around in their holes.   They cannot digest it.  It works for me on gophers and prairie  dogs.  Prairie dogs need about three pieces to get totally plugged up.  Just put it in a fresh hole. 

Chewing Gum
"Putting chewing gum in a fresh mound for the gopher to eat has been a long-time home remedy for gophers. Many experts dismiss its effectiveness, but consider what a California organic farming advisor has to say about gum. "There have been lots of laughs over the idea of using bubble gum as a gopher killer, but I have seen it work for two growers, so I am not laughing any more.  It is certainly a cheap and easy trick to try."

http://www.pesticide.org/pubs/alts/gophers/gophers.html 

[SHOOTALL]

We use moth balls , find the runs and punch thru. every 5-6 feet dropping in a moth ball !
can't say what it does to them but either they die or go away ! either is just fine !