62 BRITISH MAMMALS 



gray, a cream colour, an orange or piebald. White moles are 

 sometimes met with ; while a white mole with a reddish-brown 

 throat, and a black mole with a white head, have also been 

 recorded. 



The teeth of the mole are less specialised than its front limbs. 

 They are the primitive forty-four in number, and consist normally 

 of three incisors, one canine, four premolars, and three molars on 

 each side of each jaw. In the adult mole, however, one of the 

 upper premolars (the first) is frequently missing, so that the 

 adult dentition is sometimes reduced to forty teeth. There is 

 also a tendency among moles, especially species allied to the 

 European moles, to lose the lower canine, which has become an 

 unimportant tooth exactly similar to the incisors in appearance. 

 The first lower premolar is tusk-like, and replaces the lower 

 canine in its functions. The lower and upper incisors are small 

 and chisel-shaped, and never assume the long tusk-like form of 

 the incisors in the hedgehogs and shrews. The upper canine is 

 two-rooted, with a heel, trenchant, tusk-like, and much more 

 important than in the hedgehogs and the shrews. 



The nose of the mole is long,^ and terminates in a blunt 

 snout,^ in which the nostrils are situated, placed close together. 

 The upper lip (the opening of the mouth is some distance behind 

 the termination of the snout) is cleft by a median line. 



The breeding-time of moles is confined to a short season in 

 the spring, generally in the month of April, though they may 

 begin to breed in March, or the breeding may continue till the 

 beginning of May. The period of gestation is about five weeks.*^ 

 The young, which are never less than two and are not known to 

 be more than seven in number (generally there are four in a 

 litter), are born quite naked, but at the age of five weeks they 



1 The mole is extremely sensitive on the snout, and can be killed by a 

 relatively slight tap on that part of the head. 



^ This snout, which plays a most important part in the burrowing of the 

 moles, is supported by a strong cartilage, which ossifies into a bone a quarter 

 of an inch long. 



' Some authorities say four and some six weeks, but five weeks seems Xx> 

 be the average time. 



