Wild creatures of garden and hedgerow 



gorged itself overnight, and then starved 

 before morning. 



When I got another mole I took care it 

 should never be short of food. It had a daily 

 allowance of sixty worms — and what a business 

 it was to get them for it day after day— but 

 sometimes many more. The average weight 

 of worms eaten in the twenty-four hours was 

 four ounces, or one ounce more than the 

 animal's own weight, which was only three 

 ounces. Had it been kept for twelve months 

 it would have wanted ninety-one pounds, which 

 would mean twenty-one thousand nine hundred 

 worms. As there are often scores, if not 

 hundreds, of moles in an ordinary meadow, 

 think what a huge quantity of earth-worms 

 must be destroyed in England in one year by 

 moles. Besides being one of the fiercest and 

 strongest of animals for its size in existence, 

 the mole must also be called the greediest ! 

 When speaking of its appetite it must not be 

 forgotten that the individual of which I write 

 was kept in a tub, so would not get as much 

 exercise as a free one, which would have to 

 travel a long way for its food, and from the 

 exercise would be sure to have an even better 

 appetite ! I was very careful to dole out the 

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