Pocket Gopher Control

[KWentling]

I had 1 of those working in the front yard and another in the windbreak. I tried drowning them, trapping them, smoke bombing them. I finally collapsed their tunnels and then sit out with the .22 in the evening. Got them both that way as they pushed dirt up out of the tunnels. I only spent maybe and hour total watching and got them.

 

[metalbender]

What we call gophers out here are in fact Richardsons ground squirrels. They decimate acres of crops. Some farmers would even pay for your ammo.

 

[yomax4]

I had tried everything on the market with marginal results. I settled on the pellets and the problem was quickly solved. The gopher dies way down in the burrow so pets won't get into them. I've never had to do a mound more than once.

 

[Tried and True]

Hello All,

Ok, I am hell bent on getting this gopher. I have tried flooding it out three times. I tried a 15min. road flare. Nothing. It is still there tearing up a section of my hill. I can't use baits or poison because of my pets. I can't seem to find the gopher gassers locally. Stores are telling me they have not been able to get those in months. I'm going to try a trap next. But I am pulling my hair out over this one. It is being very sly. Any ideas? Would the exhaust from my gas riding mower work? How about from my newer diesel tractor? Thanks, B.

On our acreage we hire out.............but we have lots of gophers. Older gentleman known locally as the Gopher Man comes out and traps them. Shows up early in a pickup with a small golf cart...........drives around placin' traps. My kids ride with him and chat his ear off. Comes back out later in the day, collects traps/gophers and we pay $3/gopher foot(one foot per gopher. not 4 ). We then turn around a get $3/foot from our township. So our gopher removal is free and I don't have to lift a finger.

Cool thing about the Gopher Man...............when we first met him he was 69 yrs old. He carriers a notebook to tally his numbers. He wanted to reach 70,000 before his 70th birthday. He did and he's still trapping today at 77. I believe he is over 80,000 now.

 

[PerroneMM]

Like the guy before said...Forget trapping and baiting and all that other stuff ...the easiest and most effective way is to hook a metal exhaust flex tube to your lawn mower muffer and stick it in the gopher hole put dirt around the tube to hold in the exhaust gases ...it will do the deed!

 

[tomplum]

By me it's moles. Some people can just think like mole and get them every time. I used these GopherHawks for the moles and they were pretty effective at first. I can't think of the name, but there is a pellet that is used for model cannons. It puts off a poison gas to fill the den. Of course, one can be crazy enough to light it....

 

[ktm250]

Hello All,

Ok, I am hell bent on getting this gopher. I have tried flooding it out three times. I tried a 15min. road flare. Nothing. It is still there tearing up a section of my hill. I can't use baits or poison because of my pets. I can't seem to find the gopher gassers locally. Stores are telling me they have not been able to get those in months. I'm going to try a trap next. But I am pulling my hair out over this one. It is being very sly. Any ideas? Would the exhaust from my gas riding mower work? How about from my newer diesel tractor? Thanks, B.

I've tried them all, Gopher Hawk has been the best, no bait, digging, no extracting a carcass . Homepage - GopherHawk

 

[ismilelots]

We have a cat who loves to dig up their nests and bring us the babies. It's a daily trade of a baby for some Fancy Feast.

 

[Gord Baker]

You have so many that my method of a burlap bag soaked with gasoline inserted in one hole and some time later (15 min) a flaming burlap bag shoved in a known connecting hole. There are Hot Shot flares that force Moles right out of their holes. The concussion would kill ground hogs. Get some Blue coloured Fly Bait used by chicken/egg farmers and blow it down into as many holes as you can afford. Doesn't look like you would want to pave the property. Are they the same as Prarie Dogs?

 

[dmjohnsnx2]

No shooting allowed in the area? Here in Saskatchewan gopher shooting has been a summer pastime for many years. Used to go shoot at farms, 3-400 in a day was a good day.

Different type of gopher, in 20+ years I've only been able to shoot 1 pocket gopher and that one was cuz he got cocky.
Sometimes my cats will sit for hours before one of the pocket gophers pop out of the holes.

 

[cdaigle430]

Hello All,

Ok, I am hell bent on getting this gopher. I have tried flooding it out three times. I tried a 15min. road flare. Nothing. It is still there tearing up a section of my hill. I can't use baits or poison because of my pets. I can't seem to find the gopher gassers locally. Stores are telling me they have not been able to get those in months. I'm going to try a trap next. But I am pulling my hair out over this one. It is being very sly. Any ideas? Would the exhaust from my gas riding mower work? How about from my newer diesel tractor? Thanks, B.

Have a heart trap with cut parsnips, then dispatch it as needed. Works evertime for me.

 

[dzoller]

Exhaust from a gasoline engine should work. It cured a rat problem I had.

Diesel exhaust may not work As it probably does not have the carbon monoxide. .?? Can’t verify this last comment.

I won't use poison either, due to the risk of pets finding & eating the dead or dying critters. I use this car exhaust to garden hose adapter for the moles in my yard. It works really well, but it either misses some or they move back in before too long. Since it's too big to fit on my tractor exhaust, I can't speak to diesel over gasoline. I use the 4wd explorer to get wherever I need to.

Amazon.com: Manning Products Underground Exterminator : Patio, Lawn & Garden

I think you can find these on ebay a couple bucks cheaper.

Good Luck!!

 

[Heysek]

Hello All,

Ok, I am hell bent on getting this gopher. I have tried flooding it out three times. I tried a 15min. road flare. Nothing. It is still there tearing up a section of my hill. I can't use baits or poison because of my pets. I can't seem to find the gopher gassers locally. Stores are telling me they have not been able to get those in months. I'm going to try a trap next. But I am pulling my hair out over this one. It is being very sly. Any ideas? Would the exhaust from my gas riding mower work? How about from my newer diesel tractor? Thanks, B.

We have killed many using two different methods. As other have said you have to first find the opening which is rather easy and then you can
1) sit in a golf cart or chair with a gun (we use 410 and gopg=her will pop his head up...usually within 30 seconds he'll appear again and then shoot...this method works best early in the morning as most of these mounds are made overnight
2) take a shop vac hose and stick in the hole, cover the opening where the hose is inserted so no air will leak out and then attach the other end of the hose to an exhaust pipe of a gas powered vehicle (I use an old truck as newer vehicles don't produce as much dirty air) and let the vehicle run for about 30 minutes. You can then remove the hose and cover the whole back up so the carbon monoxide won't escape. Diesel engines don't produce carbon monoxide so they won't work.
Both of these methods have worked for me.

 

[dmjohnsnx2]

You have so many that my method of a burlap bag soaked with gasoline inserted in one hole and some time later (15 min) a flaming burlap bag shoved in a known connecting hole. There are Hot Shot flares that force Moles right out of their holes. The concussion would kill ground hogs. Get some Blue coloured Fly Bait used by chicken/egg farmers and blow it down into as many holes as you can afford. Doesn't look like you would want to pave the property. Are they the same as Prarie Dogs?

Pocket gophers are completely different critters than ground hogs and praise dogs. They're more like moles, they stay underground. OP already said he can't use poison baits on his property, I run into the same problem, if the pocket gopher eats the bait then comes out of his/her burrow a raptor, coyote, cat, dog or other critter could get poisoned as well.

 

[tomplum]

Yep, that metal flex pipe slid over the exhaust pipe on a riding mower with the muffler removed gasses them as well. Not too tight to release some of the back pressure.

 

[Avenger]

I've tried everything to kill the damn gophers on my property. What I found works is this:

Amazon.com

Use that with the pellets. Works like a champ! Simply probe around the mound until you feel it drop into the tunnel. Apply the pellets by turning the crank a few times. I knock down the mound and dont see it come back. The moles eat the pellets, run down deep into their holes, and die. I have pets, and they dont dig them up. The pellets disintegrate once its rains and is not an issue.

My ritual once I come home in the spring and summer months, is to grab the probe and walk the yard. Kill any mounds before even going inside. Soon, no more mounds.

 

[greenerdreams]

I second(or third) the exhaust gas. No gophers in western wa, but lots of moles. My dad was from mining country and used to put carbide pellets into the holes and it worked, I can't get that so i tried mower exhaust and it works. I use a piece of flexible metallic electical conduit that fits inside my mower exhaust outlet. stick it in the hole and somewhat seal it with dirt. I leave for prob 20 minutes depending on how many mounds there are. Usually after one go at it I get no more mounds for quite a while until a new critter moves into my yard. I did it in the summer once and the exhaust ended up frying the roots of the lawn where the tunnels ran and i had a network of dead lawn that looked like a road map for a while.

 

[Sapper50]

We have a LOT of pocket gophers where we live in Texas- will not use poison for a LOT of reasons.
If I position these correctly, they work 100% of the time and lethal and fast on em.
I have never found a trap that was tripped that did not have a gopher attached.
Find a hole with recent activity - determine the run, dig it out enough to set the trap on the run, the gopher will return to 'fix' the clearing out you did and bingo.

https://www.cinchtraps.com/

 

[rangerfredbob]

I've shot around 20 pocket gophers with a 20ga shotgun this year... I just take a walk in the morning and evening and watch for them pushing dirt, usually they'll stick their head out real quick so it's a small target... At my house I don't have many directions I could shoot a .22LR without the bullet going somewhere not good so I use a shotgun... I could have gotten a few more if I had a .22 since I was too far away when they spotted me but hey... I have traps too, but my success rate is better with the 20ga... I pull them out of the holes and leave them for the hawks and such...

 

[dmjohnsnx2]

I've been trapping pocket gophers in my 2.5 acre yard for 20+ years. When I put I'm my sprinkler system they enjoyed the fresh dug dirt, pocket gophers also like to chew through power lines, my neighbor and I have both had to replace major power lines due to this. They also like to chew through pvc lines, again, we've had to replace sprinkler and water lines to the house.

Male pocket gophers like to make lots of mounds, female pocket gophers tend to make bigger mounds in a smaller area. There have been times when I have dug up entire runs 20'-30' on a side...that's 1 pocket gopher! At that point all 4 corners of the runs went vertical so I had to set traps.

I use pincer traps 99.9% of the time, if I do have to use poison pellets I will take a 4'x4' sheet of plywood and put it over the hole to protect wildlife as much as I can.
For awhile this last summer 3 of my 4 cats started using pocket gopher mounds as potties, that kept them under control as well.

There is no way to completely get rid of them, I've tried. The Rodenator would probably be the easiest way to go other than traps, unless you have time to sit in a golf cart with a shotgun. If you're gonna try shooting them, they make .22 rodent rounds, it's like a shotgun round for a .22.