The sandbags dotting a stretch of land near a Kansas shopping center aren’t there to keep water out. They’re being used to keep some prairie dogs in their place.

The Hutchinson News reports that a long-established prairie dog colony near a Home Depot store has begun spreading into open land south of the Hutchinson Mall.

Dan Flores, the mall’s general manager, says the goal is to keep the migrating prairie dogs from moving into new territory and tearing up the ground. So mall crews have been placing sandbags on new holes for several weeks.

Flores says the hitch so far is that passers-by keep removing the sandbags. He asks that people leave them in place.