Yellow Pocket Gopher 
87 
the same individual may throw up a series of small mounds 
very close together; as a rule v^hen they are some distance 
apart they are of considerable size. 
A gopher which was kept in confinement for some little 
time by Dr. Merriam ran backward as easily as forward, and 
seemed to use the tail as an organ of touch when running 
backward. The tail is large and fleshy, and this seems 
to be its function. 
Gopher burrows may be said to be endless — they begin 
nowhere and never end until the owner dies. He is always 
working at them, and never seems to have any plan of work ; a 
layer of soft ground may induce him to dig through it, then a 
stone causes a turn, a tender root of some kind starts it 
off after that. Perhaps the creature is working in some- 
body's garden, and there is a melon that the animal has 
taken a fancy to; the tunnel is carried under the melon, an 
opening made up to the surface, and the whole interior of the 
fruit can be eaten without giving any external evidence that 
anything is wrong. The gopher often has two or more 
headings which it is working on at the same time, now 
digging a little at one and again at another, and there seems 
to be no part of its open workings which it will not traverse 
sometime every two or three days at least. While the 
portions of the workings that are in use are always kept 
open and practically free from dirt, those which have been 
abandoned are generally filled up with earth packed tight; 
this packing usually begins at the surface opening through 
which the animal has been throwing out earth, and extends 
back from that often for quite a little distance. The main 
tunnel is usually from six inches to a foot below the surface 
but may at times be deeper, in the case of hard or frozen 
ground. In uncultivated ground the gophers may do much 
good by turning over the soil and burying weeds and other 
plants under their mounds. This vegetable matter decays 
