Mole Man Metrics

If I may mischievously misquote the first line of one of my favourite novels "The Go-Between" by L.P. Hartley:

"The country is a foreign country: they do things differently there."

then this contains an essential truth, of the difference between town and country that is pertinent to this blog entry. A couple of fields down from Balintore Castle in the Auldallan direction, a macabre spectacle is currently on display - a phalanx of crucified moles. I have never seen this before, but logic tells one this is a mole catcher's way of letting the world know he has done his job well. In my job we have "software metrics"; here we have a head count. I would contest there is no moral difference.

Indeed a year or so earlier, I spotted a be-tweeded figure walking around a field on the other side of the road. His movements were strangely slow and he was clearly communing with a higher power. "What is he doing?" I asked. "He, " replied my friend Andrew who is infinitely more steeped in country lore than myself "is the mole catcher". 

It struck me as odd then, as it does now, that a living can be made this way and the odd yet deliberate movements of the mole catcher indicated that he was tuned into the natural world in ways that I couldn't even imagine.

Making a spectacle of death is overlaid in the human domain with much cultural significance, not just the afore-referenced and timely crucifiction at Easter, and I am put in mind of one of my favourite songs "Strange Fruit" which contain the relevant lines.

Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze

Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees

In truth, I am not certain I have seen a mole in the flesh  before. They were somewhat larger and more uniform in size than I would have expected. Their claws are eerily reptilian, creating an ambivalence with the lovable moles in children's literature. However, I inwardly salute all wild mammals who can make a living in the wilds of Angus, especially those that can do it underground. :-)

"strange fruit" close to Balintore Castle