RODENTS AND MOLES AS PESTS IN BULB PLANTINGS 5 



greater because the smaller species often fill in the older runways 

 with the soil excavated from the new and thus leave above ground no 

 evidence of activity to betray their presence. By contrast, the mole 

 keeps open and in repair all parts of its runway system, except the 

 upridged hunting paths in drier weather. Ridged runways con- 

 structed by the mole are at times used in the lighter soils by small 

 species of pocket gophers — both in Oregon and in California. 



The pocket gopher is a miner, storing in underground chambers 

 its treasures of roots and bulbs by the handful or the peck. The shal- 

 lower caches can be located later by the thick tufted growth of tulip 

 plants at the surface ; the deeper stores, usually the larger, may be 

 sought out and recovered by the grower if he has the will and patience 

 to dig out the runways in time to salvage the planting stock. This 

 will probably be sadly mixed, however, as to varieties. -Loss of tulip 



**ifc&&)L*. 



■„■•*-■■■> i - t 



- v 



Figure 2. — Pocket gopher damage to gladiolus planting, near Encinitas, Calif. 



bulbs to pocket gophers will occur at any time from the day they are 

 put into the ground to the time the plants flower, but the greater 

 damage to beds or fields usually occurs in winter, when they are less 

 closely watched. 



GLADIOLUS 



The gladiolus bulb (or conn) is less esteemed as food by burrowing 

 mammals than are the tender bases of the stems, but that arch enemy 

 of edible underground plant structures, the pocket gopher, may not 

 have its way in a gladiolus planting without serious risk to the floral 

 products and hence to the grower's profits. A single pocket gopher 

 will make a large desert spot in a " glad " field (fig. 2) ; for the animal 

 stores inordinately by instinct, without respect to its needs. Observa- 

 tions or complaints of damage by field and meadow mice to gladiolus 

 are not unusual, but the loss from such depredations is not great. 



