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Controlling Alberta’s Gopher Population

The Social Credit government implemented a penny bounty per gopher tail in the 1930’s.Many school teachers were responsible for signing the declaration forms. Students brought in gopher tails in little bags to the school to be counted. What a "stench"! Some teachers never opened the bags. Whatever number the boys claimed was good enough. Sometimes each tail had been multiplied into more than one part.

Rural municipalities paid a bounty on crow and magpie eggs as well. As money was scarce in the "Depression Era", school students found collecting eggs and gopher tails a good way to make a little money.

The following story as told by a magpie egg collector. - I was a depression child. Everybody was in the same boat. Mine was a really good up bringing. We lived on a quarter section of land. Our garden was big. Berries were there for the picking. Even some meat was butchered now and then. Eggs were as close as the hen house.Cash - in our house - was practically non existence, so we were always anxious to earn a bit. The municipality offered a cent a piece for gopher tails, a cent a piece for magpie eggs, Magpie legs brought twelve cents a pair - also the same for crow’s legs. This was an effort to cut down on the "overpopulation" of these pests in our area. Crows were a nuisance as they took the housewife’s baby chicks. I always started out with 2 gopher traps. As you took the gophers out of the trap (dead), you removed the tails. The magpie eggs (my particular choice in my money earnings) tend to be in lower trees, especially willow trees. The branches tended to scrape and scratch as one clambered up and down. (I had scars from those forays till just recently.). I loved the challenge (especially if I was vieing with my brother). When we had a dollars worth accumulated we headed off to "cash" our earnings. In my day it was Harold Hopkins who handed the "pay out". Our spending money went a long way as we were very cautious about spending that well earned cash.