When you learn the secret, let me know........they have discovered my veggies. I am slowly digging up the garden and putting that 1/2 inch square metal stuff used in construction (I can't remember what its called) at the bottom of the beds, but that is costly. The deterrants I have found say not to use them in a veggie garden. I tried daff bulbs (over 1500) and they helped some, but not in the veggie garden. My husband took the .22 away from me; he told me I couldn't just start shooting in the ground. Sigh. I hate gophers, too......

Me three! The gophers are sooooo bad this year. I think they multiplied over the winter. Will be getting the poison grain out and hoping it will help. I planted a lot of castor bean plants this spring--in the ornamental garden. Will see if this keeps them away. I hate killing anything, but gophers are so destructive. I made quarter inch hardware cloth containers for lots of my plants--takes time and money, and the edges can be painful, if you aren't careful and catch a finger. They don't seem to like to work around the prongs on the tomato cages, so the tomatoes are safe--but everything else looks like a root buffet to them.

Sandy

Hardware cloth! That's what its called!

I have been doing great catching them in box traps up to 5 in 2 weeks and I have a 20x30 garden

Check every bit of your property every day. Every time you see new mounds, put out the box trap and set it twice daily till you catch it. Then leave the hole exposed for a few days to see if the tunnel is still occupied by another gopher that fills in the hole. You just have to keep after it and never give them a break. I have caught well over 200 in my box traps, but there have been 8 or 10 that I could never catch.

I don't use anything other than box traps anymore. I still have to trap a dozen of so each year that move into the 8 acres around my house.

I have 40 acres around mine and not sure if I will ever win. Sorry little buggers.They got smarter and started packing my box traps with dirt. Covered them with everything I could think of. Dirt and trash can lids to make sure no light was getting in. Packed them anyway. Finally switched to poison grain. They are just so hard to see under mulch sometimes. They have destroyed stuff before you know it. My husband use to say he was going to come home and all that was going to be left was our house up on a mound. I was going to blow everything else up. Caddy Shack isnt nearly as funny to me now.

I don't think it is critical to keep light out, except along the edge where the trap meets the edge of the dirt tunnel. What is critical for me is to set the trap so that the two pieces of metal just barely rest on each other and the trap snaps with only a little "push". If the trap is triggered and full of dirt, then I make it where it doesn't snap so easily.

Some of the little guys push a bunch of dirt at a time, and some only push a little bit.Some are easy and some are really hard. I usually get them but it takes 4 or 5 tries sometimes. Even then there have been a few that required more extreme measures.

Does the poison grain force them out of the hole in search of water or anything? I have owls that periodically come by,,,,,,,,not enough quite obviously.

I use only box traps also. I am afraid of killing someone's pet with the poison. I also check the trigger on the trap, and if there is a burr at the end of the wire I file it off. Sometimes mud will collect on the wire and it will not trip easily. Do whatever it takes to make the latch trip at the slightest touch. I never cover my traps with anything other than very little soil, grass clippings or leaves. I always leave light shining through the outside end of the trap.

Larry

.410 is better than .22 IMO

mo

Several years, we planted daffodils completly around our 1/3 acre garden to prevent gophers from getting in. Those of you smarter than me already know that we trapped them in there and kept them from getting out. It's been poison grain ever since. Where do you get the traps?

How do you know if its a gopher or a mole????

Well, our gophers pop out every now and then and wave. Seriously, that's what it looks like. They stare. Our gophers push our daffodils thorugh the tunnels and out the top.....sigh. Maybe I'll get the .410

Dorothy, the traps can be purchased from Farmers Co-op, Atwoods and Ace hardware. I use to use the traps made in Oklahoma, the last I bought I expect was an import, but having good luck with it also. it is a little larger than the Oklahoma traps.

Ok, im almost positive mine are moles. I use baits. But with 100 acres it is a constant battle....

I once saw a segment of Oklahoma Gardening that showed the difference in mole and gopher mounds and runs, but the only thing I remember is that moles are meat eaters--mostly grubs and earthworms--and gophers are root eaters. I once watched a lily in bloom wiggle around and then disappear down a hole. So gopher. But I've never seen them come up and look around. The dogs may have tho, because they catch one occasionally.

Wish you could train a dog to catch em. I'd pay for that training any day.

I think those little terriors (i think jack russells) love to go after moles and gophers.. I need to buy about 50 of them!!!!!

We use a team approach. The box traps are effective and my dog is a cold blooded murderer that kills anything he can catch. After watching me set traps he finally learned to stalk them in the field and catch them himself. Only problem is he likes to bring them in the house :-)

one more

one more

That is awesome. I had a sheltie catch one once. She brought it in the garage it bit her on the end of the nose in a stand off. He had his mouth wide open at her. Of course I killed it. She never caught another one. Not really sure I blame her. Those are some pretty wicked teeth! I have a cat that will catch baby rabbits and bring them to my porch. Wish she would switch to the stinkin gophers!!!

Looks like the gophers have gone crazy all of a sudden in my gardens. Got some traps, set them last night. When setting the traps, i noticed my gopher holes were very tiny, almost mole size, my traps may be sligtly too large.

That dog is a gardener's best friend, JC!

Our cats catch baby rabbits and bring them to us alive. We then put the cats inside and release the bunny further from the house. When we let the cats back outside an hour or two later, they've forgotten about the bunnies.

Our cats kill moles and gophers, and sometimes voles, but often the voles will survive for a while because they are active at night when the cats are inside for their own safety (too much wildlife roaming at night).

kfrinkle, Have y'all had a lot of rain? I had voles pop up in the garden last week in a pathway after we'd had about 3" of rain over a 3-day period. I stomped their mound flat and their rebuilt it in less than an hour. I stomped it flat again. They rebuilt it overnight. I stomped it again. They went away. Sometimes you don't necessarily have to kill them....just really annoy them and they'll go away.

Dawn

I had so many gophers & Moles you could not take a step without sinking in a run or tunnel... just tried everything to get rid of them & then...last year I bought a bottle of ground cumin to cook some mexican dishes..husband hated the taste of it...sooooooo I put it out in the runs & mounds of the gopher & moles & let me tell you... they are gone! Rain has washed out all the runs & this year I have come across only three & have put the ground cumin there & they are gone.
I put a good tablespoon anywhere there were fresh tunnels or mounds. Cumin is expensive but I only used the 1 bottle last year. Bought a new bottle this year & only used it three times so far. Give it a try..it worked miracles here.

I just ask my wife if she had any cumin. I had 5 squash plants in a flower bed, I only have 3 now. I found about 2" of two plants sticking above the mulch. The bottom of the plants had been eaten and pulled down into the run. I set the trap about an hour ago and I expect it is full of dirt by now.

Larry

hmmmm. I've tried everything else, so, tequila and cumin, here I come!
Honestly! They have eaten green beans, chamomille (surrounded by daffodils) and actually came up in the garlic patch.
I'll try anything (well, not the llighted propane trick) at this point.

I just checked my trap------------got him, or her.

Cumin is less than $10 for a large bottle at Sams. I'd gladly pay 5 times (or more) than that to NOT have gophers. I'm gonna try it....although the 22 does work well when DH is behind it. It's just a bit LOUD on a peaceful Saturday morning when I'm out puttering in the garden.

I've also had some luck with a stick of Juicy Fruit...carefully placed without touching with the human hand. They can smell a human. And I've had good luck with the Castor Oil spray and granules although they have to be applied more often than I have time to spend.

I know everything has a place in the "food chain"...but honestly, I DO. NOT. UNDERSTAND what God was thinking when He created this rodent.

GOOD JOB, LARRY!!!! One less to reproduce!

Paula

I could understand their existence if ALL they ate were the sandburrs....but that's all the understanding I got. I picked up the cumin yesterday. And red pepper flakes just in case. (If I tried to put juicyfruit in a gopher hole, WITHOUT touching it, I would look like Mo, Curly or Larry, take your pick)

I read all the gopher threads I could find after they started tearing up our lawn. I started with Juicy Fruit, which they simply pushed back out, then went on to poison pellets, then gas. Nothing worked. I didn't want to do the traps you have to bury because that would require digging up even more lawn, and it seemed like it wouldn't be a sure thing--you have to use 2 in each tunnel, sometimes they pack dirt in them, etc.

Then I found a message board talking about gopher wire vs. hardware cloth, and there was mention of Cinch Traps. You have to buy them online, but it was worth it. No extra digging, you just put them down the hole and when they come to block up the opening, BAM! I caught 6 in as many days and I'm ecstatic!

I bought some HUGE smoke bombs one year at a fireworks place, looked like a little stick of dynamite, when I found a few gopher holes in my flower beds, I lit those puppies, shoved them in the hole as far as I could and covered it with dirt. I did it as fast as i could with every hole i could find I killed a few gophers that year with those smoke bombs.

My problem the past few years has been moles. I have a guy who comes out and baits them for me every month. Keeps them under control in the yard but the pastures were really bad last year. They don't seem as bad this year, I'm wondering if it's all the rain.

I tried everything . . . and I mean everything! Finally I made up an expanding material that I could pour down their holes and burrows and fill it up with a thick gel we call 'Gopher goo'. They HATE it and it goes all the way down to where the nest and live and stays there turning into soil so they have to move on or start over, and it turns out they are lazy and scared and do that once if at all. I do not need baskets or Hardware cloth anymore and neither do my friends and neighbors. If we have a gopher we Go for our Goo and you can too at Gophergoo.com. It sure helps me sleep at night!

Don't think so.

This thread is kind of like the actual gopher problem. Never totally goes away.

LOL