Weeds and pocket gophers

I have finished spraying two pastures and the hayfield with herbicide to kill weeds.  I also re-sprayed the north pasture to catch the weeds I missed and to get the new Canadian Thistle weeds that sprouted since I last sprayed the pasture.  It took one tank and a long hot 90 degree afternoon to re-spray the north pasture.

As I continue the going gets slower due to more weeds.  Also, this year I am not skipping past the snowberry bushes.

Here is one patch of snowberry bushes.  The second photo is a close up of a bush with a couple white berries.

The Chaparral herbicide seems work nicely.  Initially I had doubts.  I realize that this time of the year - August - is a poor time to spray and that the weeds' metabolism is very slow right now.  Still it seemed like the weeds weren't dieing.  The snowberry plants especially seemed immune to the herbicide.  Then - boom! - they all died.

Still when it came time to buy more herbicide, since I was done with the snowberry bushes, I thought of dialing it down to a 2-4-D herbicide.  $47 versus $127.  But the herbicide specialist at CHS recommended I keep using Chaparral herbicide as I have lots of Canadian Thistle weeds left to spray and I need a herbicide that would get into their connected root system and not just the plant itself.  I could go with a cheaper herbicide but would have to spray and re-spray costing time and money.

Sunday I started on the third pasture.  Just in time as a number of Canadian Thistle plants I had cut the seeds off of, are starting to grow new seeds. Since I didn't spray this pasture for a few years now the thistle are getting worse.  So the going will be slow this year.


I also finally got serious about the pocket gophers.  I got all eight traps out across the three pastures and in a matter of days trapped almost all the gophers.  Which was only fourteen. I have two traps left in the middle pasture.  I have either one or two gophers left.  It all depends if the pocket gopher moved from an area where I had a trap to the new dirt mounds that showed up Sunday.  I also notice dirt mounds in the hayfield but while the cattle are in this field I will have to wait to place traps here.

A few days ago I had one pocket gopher trap go missing from its hole.  In the past I have had a trap go missing when a dog or cat got a hold of the trap to get at the trapped gopher.  This missing trap was in the middle pasture so I'm not sure what kind of animal got the trap.  I haven't found the trap yet.