38 



COMMON MAMMALS OK W KS TKIi N MONTANA. 



Gophers sometimes cause serious breaks in the main ditches of 

 irrigation systems, but more often their burrows interfere with the 

 smaller laterals and are thus an annoyance rather than a serious 

 menace. The animals like to work in soft, damp ground, and find 

 soil under the laterals well suited to their wants— with the result 

 that, when water is again turned into these ditches, they are found 

 to be obstructed by the gopher mounds or pierced by their burrows. 



Fig. 31. — Stock of apple troo killed by pocket gophers. 



Garden truck of various kinds is sometimes attacked by pocket 

 gophers, and potatoes are often seriously damaged. Once while 

 helping a rancher dig potatoes in Sanders County, Mont., the author 

 found that a gopher burrow followed each row and that at least one- 

 fifth of the potatoes had been taken. 



POCKET GOPHERS AS TICK HOSTS. 



Although one seed wood tick was taken from a pocket gopher se- 

 cured in August, 1911, gophers so seldom serve as tick hosts and spend 



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