1920.] 



The Common Mole. 



665 



taught ODe captive to % come for food at the sound of scratching 

 the earth or the side ol its box. 



Enemies oi the Mole. — The mole's natural enemies in Great 

 Britain are few and incidental. Our native snakes are not 

 able to tackle so iaige a prey successfully, although adders 

 have been said to swallow them. 



The weasel has often been caught in mole traps set in the 

 runs, and doubtless the larger stoat preys upon moles occa- 

 sionally, but it is not likely that the stoat can follw the mole 

 along the runs. 



The heron probably snaps one up by the waterside now and 

 then, as this bird has been known to swallow a nearly f nil- 

 grown water vole. 



The writer has often found moles' skulls and bones in owls' 

 pellets. He once possessed a fox terrier which would hunt 

 moles successfully, scratching one out of a molehill beneath 

 which it was working, but the dog would never treat the moles 

 seriously as he would rats, and he never troubled to shake or 

 kill them. 



Mole-catchers have asserted that foxes dig out and eat the 

 young, and that badgers will dig up traps and eat the dead 

 moles out of them. 



It does not seem that rooks prey on moles, although crows, 

 may do so. and the larger hawks may account for a few. 



Man. of course, is the mole's greatest enemy, especially now 

 that the skins have a commercial value. 



Whether the mole is harmful or beneficial to agriculture of 

 course depends entirely upon local conditions. On heavy soil 

 the tunnels are useful as drains, and the earth turned up serves 

 as top dressing when spread by bush-harrowing: but on pasture 

 land, if mole heaps are too numerous, a large percentage of 

 surface is lost. In mowing grass the heaps are a great 

 nuisance, as they clog the machine cutters. The mole's sur- 

 face burrowing is also injirrious to all crops when in the seedling 

 stage. The animals consume many of the farmer's enemies, 

 and never vegetable matter, except a very trifling amount 

 swallowed inadvertently. 



