There is nothing sadder than to come into your garden, to check on your newly planted tree only to find it laying horizontal on the ground with the roots chewed off. Or worse the whole small tree gone altogether! Gophers- ugh. The scourge of the home gardener and landscaper alike. In New Hampshire we used the baskets to protect the plants from Voles. They eat roots and the bark off the base of the shrubs and trees. Building gopher baskets can be fast and easy
This is my second blog on these devils and in this article I want to show you some materials and home made baskets that can help defeat these animals.
First off you need galvanized wire cloth also known as aviary wire, a good pair of wire cloth cutters and leather gloves.
You want small square openings that a gopher or vole cannot go through. It is important to get galvanized wire cloth so it doesn’t rust out quickly. The roll widths vary but 2′ wide is good for 1 gallon and 5 gallon plants then you can size up to 3′ wide for 15 gallon trees as needed. The rolls come with the fine wire shown in the photos wrapped around it. Score! That saves some money when building wire gopher baskets. I cut it into 2-3″ pieces as shown on my glove in the photo. Fit the wire cloth around the plants in the pots, that you are going to plant and check the size. You can see in the photo with my gloves and wire scissors, that I cut the 2′ width wire cloth in half to fit with the pots I am planting. To get the wire cloth to lay flat, lay it on the ground with the roll up side down then walk on it or lay some heavy blocks on it to get it to lie flat. Cutting it is easier when its not springing up towards you.
Leave 3-6″ of area around the root ball area to allow the plants to send out new roots and establish. Cut lengths of wire cloth to fit around the pot plus the allowance noted above. The wire cloth circle should be taller than the pot (5-6″) to allow the bottom of the cage to be closed up and for the wire cloth to stick up out of the ground 1-2″.
Cut section of the wire cloth allowing an overlap of the wire cloth 2-3″ and secure with small sections of wire. Secure in 2-3 places making a circle. On one end pf the circle cut down 3-4″ vertically in 4-5 places. These are flap sections that will be bent down to form the bottom of the basket. You don’t need to wire them together since the pressure of the plant and soil will hold the bottom in place. The last photo shows the finished wire baskets. I had openings in the centers of the bottoms of mine so I cut a little square of wire cloth to cover the opening. Presto- in no time at all you have a wire cage for the roots of your plants.
There is another method I use sometimes for small 4″ pots or trough shaped planting holes for bulbs. That is a canoe shape basket. Make a circle just like the photos above then just squeeze the bottom of the basket shut and bend over the edge. This is easier with chicken wire but chicken wire doesn’t last well in the ground and has bigger openings.
When planting either type of basket, dig a wide hole 3-4″ wider than the basket and same depth as the basket. Then set that basket in the ground leaving 1-2″ of the wire showing above the grade if you can. This keeps gophers from diving in over the side of the basket when they above ground.
It is essential to get the soil pushed down around the basket and around the plant root ball. I use my fingers to push down around both but you can also use a broom handle to push down with. You do not want any air pockets around the root ball because the roots will die if they hit air pockets. Water in the plants with a slow running hose or water from a bucket and backfill with more soil as needed. Always amend the soil that came out of the planting hole with compost or soil conditioner and add slow release fertilizer as per the label directions. Some soil conditioner already has fertilizer in it so you don’t need to add it twice.
Avoiding gopher and vole damage is worth the extra cost and effort of building gopher baskets. I spent a pleasant hour or so sitting in the yard, under the trees turning gorgeous colors this Autumn making these baskets. Now my plants can thrive next Spring!
