How to gopher proof your garden.....

Gophers. We learned the hard way. After losing many brand new and well established plants we decided to get smart when it comes to protecting our garden.
There are several steps you can take to keep gophers from destroying all of your efforts.
The first and most important step is to use wire gopher proof baskets to protect everything you plant in the ground.
 We order Digger's brand in bulk.....1 gallon, 3 gallon, 5 gallon, and 15 gallon baskets and use them whenever we put in a new plant. 

https://gopherbasket.com/
You can also find them on Amazon...but not all sizes are available.

These wire baskets save the lives of our rose bushes, fruit trees, and  ornamental plantings.
(This advice is from experience....and not compensated in any way.)

Digger's Brand Root Guard Heavy Duty Basket 

Another important step to thwart gophers is to learn which plants they tend to avoid. 
They don't eat belladonna, foxglove, or lavender.
 They avoid feverfew....which all have lovely flowers.
There are so many wonderful plants they don't find edible.
Here is a link to pictures of some of the plants that have lived long lives in our garden unbothered by the many resident gophers 
(so far): 

https://gopherproofgarden.blogspot.com/2018/05/gopher-resistant-plants.html

For Raised Beds:

Your next best friend (after gopher baskets) is galvanized hardware cloth.

It works wonders to keep the gophers out of raised beds where wire baskets wouldn't be useful.

We don't just line the bottom of the beds.....we line the entire earthen area where the beds will be placed which creates an effective barrier and keeps gophers from digging under the beds (which they are prone to do).

In the past we stapled chicken wire to the bottom of the beds to protect the plants. That was not enough! The gophers just dug under the beds and ate away any roots that grew below the beds....and then when the wire deteriorated after a year or so it was a free for all.

Now we lay four foot wide strips of galvanized hardware cloth over the entire area where the raised beds will be placed. 

We buy it in 48" rolls and lay it out in overlapping rows.....covering as much area as possible attaching it to the ground with landscape staples. The raised beds are placed on top of these rows  and then they get a separate layer of hardware cloth lining that goes along the bottom of the beds  and up the sides for extra protection. 

It may be overkill....but it works like a charm.

spinach

This roll is only 25" wide....but comes in handy if you decide to make home-made gopher baskets.

Carrots. You can see where the rolls overlap in this picture.

 onions

Here you see rectangular hardware cloth fit that is bent  to fit into a round keyhole garden that the gophers used to ravage. I took out all the soil and lined the bed with the hardware cloth before replacing the soil. It worked! That is a baby musa banana tree along with some volunteer fever few plants. They sprout everywhere but gophers don't touch them.

Another keyhole garden lined with the cloth.These are volunteer tomato plants.

I also make movable covers out of hardware cloth to lay over the top of the raised beds to protect tender young plants that appeal to the cotton-tail rabbits, squirrels, chipmunks, and other hungry critters that visit the garden looking for food.

You won't find any gophers digging in between the beds when the space is covered in hardware cloth.

Here the hardware cloth is wrapped around the pole beans to keep the hungry rabbits from eating all the leaves like they used to do.



Attach the hardware cloth to the ground with landscape staples. They come up easily if you end up moving the raised beds around.
Available on Amazon.

Also see this list of gopher resistant plants:

http://gopherproofgarden.blogspot.com/2018/05/gopher-resistant-plants.html