MAMMALS mentions that it is considered unlucicy to see a hedge- hog near a house and therefore they are destroyed. Hedgehogs are stated to be most numerous in the northern part of the county. 8. Mole. Talpa europaea, Linn. Mr. J. B. Pilley has collected some very in- teresting statistics regarding the colour variations of the mole. Practically all the recorded variations occur within the county as will be seen by comparing his list with that given by Bell. Mr. Pilley finds that moles are very numerous in Herefordshire and show no visible decrease in number, although very many are trapped. A local furrier has received from this county alone, during the last four or five years, about 175,000 skins; some 40,000 of these were received during the year 1905. The number of variant skins he estimates at about one in every 5,000. The most common variations he finds to be the following : orange spots on the belly and less often on the back ; light grey ; grey with light drab spots. Black specimens also occur, and cream coloured ones ; there were several orange coloured and one perfectly white. A mole, creamy white in colour, was caught in a trap at Cobnash, a small farm ^ miles from Leominster. Six or seven were also caught within a short time at Shobdon. The Rev. S. Cornish Watkins says : 'In the winter of 1901-2, two moles, cream coloured with orange markings on the back, were trapped in the same field at Hunting- don just above Kington. The skin of one is now in my possession. I saw the corpse of a white one, much decayed, hung up in a hedge with others at Huntingdon in October, 1898. Another was killed in the same farm in 1897. It is curious that all these should be from the same district, as I never saw another elsewhere in Herefordshire.' The variations of the mole are probably very local in occurrence and would repay study and careful comparison with local variations elsewhere.' The conditions which govern the number of moles are probably extremely local. Mr. John Riley of Putley Court, Ledbury, records that the number trapped has kept fairly constant for some twenty-five years, being rather more than an average of one to the acre every year. On one grass field no moles were ever seen, and when ploughed up for fruit-growing in October, 1906, no wire-worms were found ; possibly it did not provide enough food to attract the moles. There is in some places a pre- judice in favour of the mole ; not only because it clears the ground of insects, but because it is considered to drain wet soil by burrowing in it. On the other hand, Mr. R. A. Swayne of Stoke Edith, a very keen observer, says, ' Moles have been unusually numerous in this neighbourhood for a year or two, but the mole-catchers appear to have reduced them. They sell the skins at, I think, zd. each. I have never heard of any variation in colour here.' The shape and direction of the tracks of the mole have formed the subject of a discussion by the Woolhope Club.' 9. Common Shrew, ^orex araneui, Linn. Although this animal is common, its local dis- tribution appears to be somewhat uneven. In the parish of Bridstow Mrs. Cooper Key records that in < See Zaol. (1877), p. 225 ; (1878), pp. ' Tram. (1869), pp. 128-36. 22, 128. twenty-seven years she has only once or twice seen a dead one. Mr. de Winton says, ' The most frequent variation is a pale fawn colour, in life or when fresh killed. This fawn coloured shrew is a very beautiful creature, and its feet are like orient pearls ; but these lovely colours soon fade.' Regarding the vexed question of shrews found dead on gravel walks, generally towards autumn, an inquiry occurs in the Zoologist for 1879 (p. 1 24), and the editor, in reply, refers to the dis- cussion of the matter in Bell's Quadrupeds (ed. 2, p. 147), and to the belief of country people that a shrew mouse dies if it crosses a path.' The Rev. S. Cornish Watkins sends the following curious instance of the owl and shrew mouse living as neighbours, a suggestive fact in this connexion, for this owl was evidently not hungry enough to eat shrews. He writes: 'In the same tree with the nest of squirrels was a barn owl's nest, and at a height of about eight feet from the ground, in a small hole, a nest of young shrews.' 10. Pigmy Shrew. Sorex minutus, Pallas. Bell — Sorex pygmaeus. Mr. de Winton writes : 'These are very common, and easily trapped in banks. I have found their remains in owls' pellets very often, and that in dis- tricts where this shrew was said to be unknown.' 1 1 . Water Shrew. Neomysfodiens, Pallas. Bell — Crossopus fodiens. Recorded by Mr. R. M. Lingwood as occurring in meadows by the River Lugg. The water shrew finds its typical home in Herefordshire streams. Mr. W. E. de Winton writes : ' Lying flat on a board placed across a stream, I have watched them feeding in shallow streams. I believe they search the bottom chiefly for water shrimps. I have taken two of these animals from the stomach of a heron.' Mr. H. A. Wadworth records that a water shrew was caught at Breinton Court about three miles west of Hereford, about I November, 1906, and was mounted for the Hereford Museum. The Rev. S. Cornish Wat- kins states that water shrews were common a few years ago in the square pool at Kentchurch. Mr. Donald Mathews, of Redditch, published in the Redditch Indkatoriox i 5 May, 1905, the following in- teresting account of his observations on the water shrew at Blakemere in Herefordshire before the year 1867. 'Very few and far between are those who have seen a water shrew in its native home When tired of play I would sit or lie down beside the water, still and quiet. Then would my little playmates come. You would see ever so little a waver in the grass and a little black object (small as the waver) run down the shallow bank right straight into the water, not diving, but running straight to the bottom of the shallow stream ; then in a moment he was spangled with hundreds of pearls, being minute globules of air he had taken with him into the stream — at this time he was a little gem indeed. With his long snout he would turn over every little pebble at the bottom of the water in search of food, consisting of aquatic insects, and would remain under water for several minutes at a time ; then he would rise to the surface like a cork and swim (so prettily) « See also Zool. (1879), p. 173. 151
