Mole Hill Curiosities
It’s the coldest day of the season so far, the thermometer is showing -4oc as I arrive at Kith. The ground is frozen solid beneath my feet, what’s usually a springy wood chipped path is now a crunchy, hollow sounding slab. I do all my usual wanders through the garden, to the shed and polytunnel and into the woodland to check everything is ok. I set my sights on the yurt and begin to walk down towards it, my plan is to set the wood burner going ready for the group arriving. Just after the spiral, on the path ahead is the most perfect fresh mole hill.
I always giggle at mole hills, they’re lovely to see at Kith and always a reminder of how we started. Scooping up the mounds from around the field, lugging them back to the space we’d eventually call the garden and then tipping them into little patches we’d grow our vegetables in. We were told by a little old lady we’d never grow anything in mole hill dirt but we thought we’d give it a try anyways. That year we had the best crop of peas we’ve ever had… maybe mole hills were a little more valuable than she realised.
So here on my path is a mole hill, atop the frozen ground, perfectly crumbly fresh. Such a curiosity.
Below our feet is a whole world we’re not privvy to. The worms, beetles, grubs, mice and moles all are still thriving, alive and working to keep warm and fed. Whilst the ground becomes too hard and frozen for us to work with, the moles find a way. They have to in order to survive after all. I love the pages in the book, Slow Down which show the mole and their worm chambers. The gruesome way they paralyse worms to preserve them, keeping them in a chamber at the end of a tunnel, their larder for when they’re hungry. I wonder at this time of the year, do the worms freeze too? Are they like eating ice-pops for the moles?
I step over the mole hill and smile as I go about my morning jobs. I know it won’t last two seconds when the children arrive, the first thing they love to do is squish the mole hills back down to the earth. Thankfully, long gone are the days we have to shovel the mounds onto the garden beds. We’re protecting the worms in the compost bins, our allies in making soil now.
This is my little mole-y sketch. I love that the mole is just a little bundle of fluff with a shrew-like nose and big digging claws. Enjoy!
I’d love to see your mole drawing, send them over if you give it a try or use #athomewithkith
How I drew our friendly mole
I began with the shape, it looks like the mole is just
- one cylindrical bundle of black velvety fluff.
- a long pointed nose
- hefty digging claws
- delicate whiskers.
Adding colour
I wanted to make sure that I captured it’s beautiful pink-peach coloured claws. They make such a contrast to the dark back of the moles fur.
With the jet black fur of the mole, the contrasting claws and muddy little nose, there’s not much more to add. I went in after the watercolours were dry to add some details to the fur with a black fine liner.
