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Moles (Talpa europaea) are firmly placed in the British psyche (many people will have read about ‘Moley’ in The Wind in the Willows) - but they are rarely seen alive. Most people, however, will be familiar with the molehills (or spoil-heaps) that moles produce during excavation of their underground feeding tunnel systems. Molehill activity tends to be greatest between autumn and spring, and some parts of the country can be riddled with molehills and tunnels. As a result moles are blamed for damaging a range of interests including farming, amenities, and gardening. |
Damage to gardens and amenity areas such as golf courses, bowling greens, cricket pitches and other recreational areas can be merely aesthetic but might also be financial if users are deterred by their presence. On racecourses, grass airstrips and sports fields, molehills could conceivably present risk of injury to pilots, horses, riders, and others participating in sport. (Moles have been famously (and falsely) implicated in the death of a king*.) |
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Farmers report a wide range of impacts including:
- contamination of silage with Clostridium or Listeria (when bacteria from molehill soil are gathered up with grass during silage production),
- covering pasture with soil (reducing the area available for grazing)**,
- injury to animals on pasture, damage to agricultural machinery,
- damage to drainage systems and watercourses,
- damage to young plants including wilting of crops (which can reduce quality and yield),
- weed invasion and subsequent degeneration of pasture on molehills.
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The most commonly used methods of controlling moles in Britain have been strychnine poisoning, kill-trapping, and gassing. Strychnine has been particularly favoured for larger-scale mole control because it is said to be very cost-effective. It is also an extremely dangerous poison, causing death through asphyxia by paralysing the respiratory muscles. Strychnine was banned in Britain by the Animals (Cruel Poisons) Regulations 1963, except for use with moles. |
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| Possible explanations for this anomaly are that: mole damage is perceived to demand action; it is the only poison available that is cost-effective on an agricultural scale; no alternative has been found; and moles die underground where their deaths cannot be seen. The continued availability of strychnine has deterred the development of alternative control methods and, as a result, improvements in mole welfare. |
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The EU is currently undergoing a major pesticide review and many pesticide products that were previously approved for use in the UK will no longer be authorised. One of these pesticides is strychnine, which was withdrawn from use in 2006. It is now illegal to use strychnine to control moles in the UK. The withdrawal of strychnine will force mole controllers to reassess their need for control, and which - if any - control methods they use. Mole control is in a time of flux and this is the ideal opportunity to study mole control needs and methods. |
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| This 3-year project is designed to establish the perceived need for mole control in the UK and to determine the effectiveness and welfare implications of mole control methods in the absence of strychnine. We will use an evidence-based, adaptive approach using information from surveys and ground-truthing to identify which control methods most appeal to mole managers now that strychnine is no longer available. This will allow us to prioritise research areas for practical examination later in the study. |
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* "Death, character, and reputation:
In popular folklore William III is supposed to have died after his horse tripped over a molehill. The incident for years after allowed Jacobites to toast the vanquishing creature as 'the little gentleman in black velvet'. Sadly for romance, the story is only partly true. Certainly William's horse stumbled on 21 February 1702 and the king broke a collarbone in the fall. However, he made a steady recovery from his injuries in the next couple of weeks, and was soon back conducting business, if not appearing in public. It was only on 5 March that the true cause of death-a pulmonary fever-became evident." From the Dictionary of National Biography - William III.
**Clostridium infection can prevent the production of silage or reduce the quality of silage produced, whereas Listeria contamination can cause listeriosis in sheep and cattle |
