Dogs On Full Help Mode

Spring is a very good time of the year for the farm dogs, Jackson and Butler. They love scouring the fields, running along with their noses skimming the tops of the green grass as they sniff for calf droppings, birds and all manner of new smells.

They have also been assisting Mike while he has been out trying to get the mole and gopher population back under control and eradicated from the current grazing soon-to-be hay growing fields.

Jackson and Butler know the routine well. If Mike has the white bucket, his special shovel, the flags and traps, the dogs are on high alert to be at the ready when a trap is pulled from the ground. They run along in front of the Gator and stand next to a flag in hopes that it is the next mound to be checked.

Mike carries different traps for the different varmints. I see a mound and think, ‘there is a mole or a gopher there.’ He sees a mound and knows exactly what kind of critter made it and sets the appropriate trap. The dogs don’t distinguish between the two until it is time to pull a caught critter out of the ground.

The moles are not edible according to the Jackson and Butler. The dogs may play with a mole for a while, tossing it up in the air and flinging it around, but they do not eat them. The gophers are highly prized culinary delights by both dogs so Mike alternates which of the two get a gopher morsel ensuring each dog gets his share. It is not so easy to separate the dogs so there is not a gopher tussle over the carcass. When Mike is checking his traps he usually has both dogs right up there in his business, so much so that sometimes he is unable to see what kind of varmint is being pulled out of the hole.

The dogs decide in a heartbeat if the critter is a mole or a gopher and either ignore it as the case of a mole or try to chomp it and pull it out of the trap in the case of the gopher.

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