Y6 



THE ILLESrOIS FAEMEK. 



Mae 



has taken the stand we assigned it. five 

 years since. When this class of men are 

 headed off in one direction, they turn to an- 

 other ; at one time vending lottery tickets, 

 at another, Chinese tree corn, Rohan pota- 

 toes, Morus Mu-lticaulis, new seedling straw- 

 berries, grapes that beat the world, Honey 

 Blades grass, prolific corn, or Japan wheat ; 

 they arc never idle, and that large class of 

 farmers who take no agricultural paper be- 

 come their easy victims. Ed. 



[For the Ilinois Farmer.] 



The Gopher. 



Near Morris, Grundy county, Ills., 

 February 18tb, 1861. 



} 



I read in your January number, "Gophers 

 Again." Let me tell you my experience, and 

 how to trap them. Some ten years ago, I planted 

 five acres in apple teees, on sandy loam, with 

 gravel subsoil, with gopher hills thrown up in 

 abundance. Some two years afterwards, as the 

 frost thawed out in the spring, some twenty of 

 my best trees tipped over, minus thtir roots. I 

 despaired of an orchard on such gopher land— 

 my neighbor, Bill Johnson, who worked my or- 

 chard in corn, proposed a war on the tribe, and 

 figured thus— bear in mind that as their deeds 

 are evil, \ hey prefer darkness to light ; that 

 they wi'l not permit a ray of light to shine into 

 any of their holes leading to their subterranean 

 passages. Open their holes at one or more places 

 in their hills leading down to the main passage, 

 take a email, very strong steel trap, set it deep 

 in the ground at an angle of about forty-five de- 

 grees, with the pan fronting the road way, leave 

 a little ray of light at the surface, shining over 

 the trap. Mr. Gopher at once repairs to the 

 spot "dirt in hand" to repair the breach and 

 soon falls a victim to their antipathy to day light. 

 I have never seen them carry dirt in their pouches 

 as some suppose, but shove it before them with 

 the fore paws, and are always caught by the fore 

 feet, and fiequently by the claws, and sometimes 

 spring the trap with the dirt ahead of the paws. 

 Gophers are not so numerous as their hills would 

 seem to indicate. Johnson caught about ten in 

 my orchard, since which, once in a year or two, 

 I discover fresh hills. Trap a gopher, and all is 

 silent again ; try it, and my word for it, you will 

 give room for this or some better dressed article 

 in your paper forthwith. 



Our neighbors north of the Illinois river are 

 not troubled with the real gopher, but think they 

 are, mistaking the striped prairie ground squir- 

 rel for gophers. 



Yours, not in cog., 



L. W. Clatpool. 



P. S. Above I send you my experience in go- 

 phers, which has been rather serious. You can 

 publish it or not, as you choose — it will only cost 

 you the reading. I do not profess to be a scholar, 

 having received my education in this country in 

 1834, in a log cabin, by shell-bark fire light, my 

 only neighbors being "Native Americans" — 

 Shabona, Wauponsa, and their tribes — neverthe- 

 less facts from such a source are of as much 

 value as if emanating from a palace. 



Any smart boy with two or three small, strong 

 Steele traps can rid your premites of gophers in 

 a day or two — the springs should be stronger 

 than usual in small traps, as they have to spring 

 through loose earth. 



Push on your paper (I will not say "valuable," 

 as that is a hacknyed phrase), and I will agree 

 to read it. 



Should you ever be at Morris, a ride of two 

 miles will. land you at my farm, where you will 

 find all sails set to the plow, and your humble 

 servant not progressing backward, I trust 



L. W. C. 



We shall hope to hear from Mr. C. often. 

 His is one of those practical pens that give 

 value for the space occupied. We hope to 

 drop down on you some day, and look 

 through your domains. We have driven 

 the gopher out of our grounds by throwing 

 down their mounds with the cultivator. A 

 large colony were safely entrenched near our 

 west line, through which we run a belt of 

 maples. The first winter and spring they 

 destroyed about t >70-thirds of the trees with- 

 in their garden. Last season we gave 

 weekly workings, and the gopher left. This 

 our readers will recollect, was the plan of 

 John R. But when they cannot be reached 

 in this way, the trap will take them out, and 

 we are not sure but the plan of Mr. C. is the 

 best, for that is the end of Mr. Gopher, 

 while the other merely changes his location. 

 We do not think the gopher is known north 

 of the Illinois and east of the Mississippi, 

 the people there calling the little striped 



