Gopher hunting??? What do you do with them?

T

thepolinator

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Hey all,
I see a few posts about gopher hunting. Just wondering what you do with the gophers after you shoot them. I can't imagine you eat them, do you sell the fur, get a bounty for killing them or just throw away the carcass?
 
Leave them where you shoot them...they get cleaned up pretty quickly by birds, small mammals and even other gophers. It's not really hunting, it more pest control.
 
You used to be able to cut the tails off and get maybe a nickel for them. Not many places do that anymore. It's mostly just shoot em and leave them.
 
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sheephunter said:
Leave them where you shoot them...they get cleaned up pretty quickly by birds, small mammals and even other gophers. It's not really hunting, it more pest control.
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To quote Clint, buzzards gotta eat, same as worms. Don't usually last long, specially if they're in bits and pieces. ;)

Grizz
 
MasterChaud555 said:
You used to be able to cut the tails off and get maybe a nickel for them. Not many places do that anymore. It's mostly just shoot me and leave them.
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RM of Brittania was giving 25 cents/tail this past spring. LOL I have a pasture I shoot that is inundated with them. I have been out maybe 5 times this past spring and burned 1000 rounds of 22 ammo. I have shot hundreds of them. The first day out I shot at least 100. Went back the following day and there was not 1 to be found?! Last time I was out the crows, gulls, and especially magpies were on them by the time I was 150 yards past them. Now I know what's eating them. And yes they are cannibalistic as mentioned before. And yes they are a pest for sure, last time out I reported back to the farmer he had a calf down with a broken leg at the far end of the pasture. About 99.9% sure it tripped in a gopher hole. There isnt 4 feet of that field not covered.
 
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DVXDUDE said:
I believe that's partly the reason coyote populations are so high out west.....Unlimited supply of gopher
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Not at all. A few free meals here and there does not sustain the growing coyote population for the year. Its the winged buzzards and scavengers who do most of the gopher carcass clean up.
 
Shooting gophers is part of life where there are lots of the little buggers. Most of us in the three prairie provinces have seen the devastation they can cause. I stumbled on a small field just crawling with gophers in western Manitoba a couple of years back. It took me four days of shooting to get rid of them. The farmer couldn't thank me enough, as he didn't have time to deal with them.

I wouldn't eat a gopher if I was starving. They can be full of worms. Some of the tree hungers think it is just awful that we shoot the cute little animals. One woman asked on a radio talk show here why they couldn't be trapped and relocated. Jaysus! We are talking about millions upon millions in just one municipality! I think the tree hungers should be relocated, maybe to the Gobi Desert.
 
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