Gopher Day

Out here in Point Mugu, California, we don't have Groundhog Day...we have Gopher Days! Early Monday morning, after Lucy and I dropped Jason off at work, we were relaxing in the dining room and I looked up from eating breakfast...to see a gopher popping up out of a new hole he was busy digging. For those of you who don't know, pretty much the whole housing complex on base is overrun with gophers. While Jason was deployed, I just thought the mounds of dirt that would appear every morning meant the gophers were alive and thriving...I even named our little gopher Benji and was very disappointed that I never got a chance to see him. I finally caught a peek of Benji the Gopher last week when he poked his head out of a new hole and then disappeared before I could run outside for a closer look. Since Jason has been home though, I've learned that gophers are actually considered pests...and war has subsequently been declared between the Rogges and the gophers.

So, after seeing little Benji repetitively pop out of his hole Monday morning, Lucy and I went outside to check out the hole digging process. And that's when it happened...while Lucy was busy sniffing the hole, I bent over and threw out my back. It was the paralyzing kind of pain that literally made me fall to the ground. Only after lying there long enough to start noticing all the spiders and bugs squirming around did I manage to crawl...yes, crawl...back into the house. I'm sure it would be pretty funny to have caught all of this on video, as I tried to stand up in the living room and almost passed out and then had to slowly crawl into the kitchen and try to get the phone off the kitchen counter. But...one of the super nice things that comes with being in an actual squadron is that when I called Jason (who was scheduled to fly and just about to get on the plane) he was immediately let off from flying and sent home to take care of me! And he did a great job; after dropping me at the hospital on base, he was able to take Lucy to the vet for her booster shots, fetch me from the hospital, make me take my muscle relaxers, and then went to the grocery store : )

While I was sleeping off the painkiller, Jason was busy engaging war tactics on the gophers. One method that we've seen neighbors employ is sticking a hose down one of the holes and watching for the gopher to pop out of the backdoor. Although this first attack wasn't as successful as anticipated, later in the evening when Jason and Lucy were playing in the backyard, Jason almost stepped on a gopher that had come above ground and was struggling for life. We decided the best thing was to put little Benji out of his misery...but here are some pictures of what gophers look like and what they do to the yard.


Little Benji struggling for life...


Deceased Benji...check out his teeth and tail!


One of the numerous gopher holes in our yard...


And one of the many gopher mounds of dirt!