Thanks, Ian. I just found your email. I'm so far behind on everything. I need to be outside in the rain (which we're very thankful for). This is certainly a busy time.
My husband says that he thinks the dogs sometimes pretend they are going after a gopher just to have an excuse to dig, but I wonder about that. The dogs come to the door with dirt on their noses in the morning when we just wake up. The dogs are more trouble than the pocket gophers. I'd certainly like to give this method a try. How does it keep the gophers from getting the roots. Should I put it in the vegetable garden too? We can't plant carrots or garlic very well. I have a huge stand of sweet cicely in the middle of the veggie garden. Sometimes when we prepare beds we find caches of sweet cicely roots carefully cut into 2" pieces and garlic that the gophers have stored. I think a pocket gopher family has lived there for years. I just gave up on them and planted carrots in pots. I don't like to kill animals, even pocket gophers, but feel all right when a cat or dog gets one. I won't buy gopher traps. We find muscari, crocus, sometimes hyacinths and tulips in funny far away places where we didn't plant them. They have set back the roots of 8-year-old fruit trees and a rambling mulligan rose became a sprout. I lost a beautiful 2-year-old soulangia magnolia. They're just tiny little things. We tried putting chicken wire under a French intensive bed one time long ago and they went in over the top. We have just accepted them, but this method would be acceptable to me if it saves the roots. Merla I & K Buckingham wrote: > >My perennial beds are very sad as one or several of the dogs (4 Golden > Retrievers) have > > been digging for pocket gophers in them. Our one-strand electric wires > > from our NZ game fence don't keep them out of the beds and I hate > > strong-arm training. I guess I need to fence every single bed on this > > place, but I don't have the time or money. How can we enjoy the flowers > > behind a fence? > > Hi Merla > > Have you tried spraying the beds with egg repellent to deter the gophers. > Works very well with rabbits and hares to deter them from new plantings of > trees etc. The recipe is as follows: > > 5 eggs > 150ml acrylic paint (sticking agent) > 600 ml water. > > Beat eggs, add paint and water, mix well and then spray on the area. I > usually strain the product through a stocking or gauze to remove any egg > white that has not mixed well, and could block the sprayer. I usually apply > with one of those small trigger bottle sprayers, or for larger areas a 2 > litre pump up Cambrian sprayer. May be worth a go. Here in NZ the repellent > lasts on tress for several months before needing to be reapplied. > > regards > Ian Buckingham > Maungatawhiri > New Zealand
