They also can cause damage in orchards, windbreaks, gardens, residential lawns, public parks, golf courses, airport runways, buried utility cables and irrigation pipes. Burrows of pocket gophers redirect surface water from main, lateral and field irrigation canals. Their mounds damage hay harvesting equipment. Pocket gophers eat a variety of plants including broad-leafed weeds, crop plants, and grasses. Gophers eat mostly roots, tubers, corms, and rhizomes exposed in their burrows.
Gophers clip off roots and strip bark below ground from young trees in windbreaks and orchards.
Occasionally, leaves and stems are eaten near burrow entrances. Their mounds also damage crops by burying them and by slowing or stopping plant growth. They can reduce forage yields in alfalfa fields, wet meadows and rangelands by 30 to 40 percent in areas they inhabit. These machines are hydraulically operated and mount on the draw bar or three-point hitch of a tractor. For most models, at least a 45-horsepower tractor is required.