Have you noticed the big sand mounds that have been popping up since we have had cooler weather?  I have answered several calls lately about the sand mounds.  The mounds are not from giant ants or moles, but rather from a critter you rarely see above the ground.  The Southeastern pocket gopher, Geomys pinetis.  It is also known as the “sandy-mounder” in Florida.  

I am not a rodent expert so I relied on one of our UF Specialists, Bill Kern and the IFAS Extension EDIS document, Southeastern Pocket Gopher to provide information for this article.  The Southeastern pocket gopher lives its life underground and has very small eyes and ears.  It has large claws on its powerful front legs that it uses to dig the extensive tunnel system.  The term pocket refers to the fur-lined cheek pouches that the gopher uses to carry food.  The lips close behind the protruding chisel-like front teeth so the gopher can chew through dense soil or large roots without getting dirt in its mouth.  They are a tan color and usually about 10 inches long with a naked tail.

The pocket gopher requires deep, well-drained sandy soils. The average tunnel length is 145 feet and can be as long as 500 feet.  Mound building seems to be more intense during the cooler months, especially spring and fall, and slower in the summer. In the spring, pocket gophers push up 1-3 mounds per day. Based on mound construction, gophers seem to be more active at night and around dusk and dawn, but they may be active at any time of day. 

The primary tunnels run parallel to the surface and most are 2 inches to 2 feet below the surface, but some tunnels may extend downward as far as 5 feet.  Nests and food storage chambers are located in these deeper tunnels. 

The pocket gopher feeds on the tap roots, crown roots, fleshy rhizomes, bulbs, and tubers of a wide variety of plants in its natural environment. Bahiagrass tubers appear to be a preferred food based on the contents of food caches. Gophers also have an unfortunate fondness for sweet potatoes, peanuts, sugarcane, alfalfa, and peas. 

Gophers reach sexual maturity at about 6 months of age. The southeastern pocket gopher usually has one or two litters per year. The average number of young per litter is 1.5 (one to three young). Although gophers breed year round, breeding is most common in March and in July or August. 

The most common problem associated with pocket gophers is the numerous large, sandy mounds they deposit on the surface. Occasionally, gophers will feed on the roots or tubers of garden, ornamental, or crop plants. In natural settings, gopher tunneling activities are beneficial. The soil gophers bring to the surface contains nutrients leached from surface soils. This natural fertilizer helps to maintain the sandhill ecosystem. The mounds of loose soil provide needed germination sites for some native plant seeds. Many amphibians and reptiles use pocket gopher mounds as homes, including Florida’s unique mole skinks. The pocket gopher tunnels themselves serve as habitat for many unique invertebrates found nowhere else. 

When pocket gophers are damaging lawns, golf courses, or gardens, it is legal for the property owners, tenants, or employees to trap them without a permit. Trapping is the most effective method for controlling the few gophers that invade yards, gardens, golf courses, or crop fields. Gophers should be maintained in natural areas and can usually be tolerated along rights-of-way for roads and power lines.  Please follow this link; http://www.edis.ifas.ufl.edu/pdffiles/UW/UW08100.pdffor specifics on trapping pocket gophers or come by our Extension office for a free copy of the publication.

If a lawn service or pest control technician is hired to trap nuisance animals that person must have a certified pest control operator’s license in Lawn and Ornamental pest control or some special certification may be required for commercial wildlife control. No poison (bait or fumigant) may be used on native wildlife in Florida, with the following exception effective July 1, 2008. 

Title 68A -9.010 (2) of the Florida Administrative Code: 

(c) Poison, other than those pesticides that are registered by the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services without additional authorizations and are only used in a manner consistent with the product labeling. 

This means that registered mole and pocket gopher products available in stores in Florida are now legal to use on these two native mammals. Some products purchased from outside of Florida on the Internet may still not be legal to use if they do not have a Florida registration. 

Gophers can be excluded from small areas such as gardens, flower beds, and even small backyards through the use of underground fences made of ½-inch galvanized hardware cloth. The barrier should extend at least 2 feet under the ground and at least 6 inches (15 cm) above the ground. Since gophers can burrow down to 5 feet, some may get under the fence, but this barrier will keep out the majority. Planting unpalatable plants such as oleanders around the edge of your property may deter gophers from entering. Unfortunately, there are no chemical repellents known to be effective against gophers. Vibrating devices have not been proven to repel gophers. Reports that Wrigley’s Juicy Fruit gum kills gophers by blocking their digestive tracts have been proven to be false. Finally, tunnel flooding has been used successfully in other parts of the country. However, this method usually does not work here since the southeastern pocket gopher is restricted to deep, well-drained sandy soils in Florida. 

The good news is that we don’t have a new giant ant or mole invading our land (at least not this year).  Pocket gophers are a native animal and are a part of Florida’s ecosystem.  Tolerate them as long as they are not causing significant damage since they provide a function in the food web.