Mexican Mole Lizard.

Image from here.

The Mexican mole lizard (Bipes biporus), commonly known as the five-toed worm lizard, or simply as Bipes, is a species of amphisbaenian, which is from Baja California, Mexico.

According to Urban legend these creatures “enter your body by the most unspeakable means”, while on the toilet.

These egg laying earth-worm like lizards have only two front arms which they use along with their strong head to dig underground burrows where they spend most of their life. They are in-fact harmless.

Digital Object – Online sources (for more information: The Reptile Database).

 

Mole Skeleton

This is a skeleton of a european mole at the Grant Museum. It is a much better photograph then the one I took, and the ones provided in the museum catalogue. It is from here. 

The combination of the distinct evolutionary features of the moles, as this skeleton shows and the fact moles were (and still are) considered a pest and in an abundance, is likely to be the reason that they were used in teaching so much, their abundance in the museum and the moles subsequent residing within the glass jar.

Courtesy of Teaching and Research Collections and UCL Museums.

Physical Object available to view at UCL Museums (search Grant Museum Catalogue: NON446)

Digital Object – Online sources.

18 Moles in Jar

Available for viewing (and more information on) at: Grant Museum, London.Image copyright held by : UCL Museums/Grant Museum.

This jar contains 18 moles. According the Mark Carnall, the curator of the Grant Museum how they came to be here it is not quite known, although it is thought that they might have been used for teaching and research in zoology and comparative anatomy, which historically included animal dissection.

The Glass Jar of Moles has it’s own twitter account, @GlassJarOfMoles. This is how they are described on twitter: “We many moles proudly reside at @GrantMuseum. A disparate lot, our interests lie in adventure, science, equality, educational disadvantage, history & worms.”

These moles also appear on the Museum of Unthings, providing an interesting, alternative story to this object.

The Grant Museum has an adoption facility. You can not adopt these moles as someone already has, though there are many others you could chose from. Check here if your interested.

Image courtesy of Teaching and Research Collections and UCL Museums.

Physical Object available to view at UCL Museums. (Search Grant Museum Catalogue: Z2754 )

Digital Object – Online sources.

Mole-Rats

Not to be confused with Mallrats. Mole-Rat is a general term for a number of unrelated groups of burrowing rodents, called blesmols.

The Naked Mole-Rat is probably the more unusual looking of the burrowing rodents, they are from the horn of Africa. They are  about 8-10 cm long and can live for up to 30 years, substantially longer then other rodents.

This study suggests due to their long life and unusual resistance to disease, in particular cancer, they would be particularly useful in genome experiments.

It is unclear if this truly is a mole rat, although it has been called so. Image from @JillJ_194 (origin unknown). But it is too good a photo not to include.

It seems our Glass Jar of Moles is not the only one with ther own twitter account. The Naked Mole Rat has one too; @TehNakedMoleRat (Described as: @Eusocialist. Tunneller. Warrior. The Sabre-Toothed Sausage – BBC)

This naked mole-rat came from a zoo. Image from here. Courtesy of Pittsburgh Zoo & PPG Aquarium

For more information on these Zambian mole-rats (and on this image) click here.

Physical Object available to view at UCL Museums (search Grant Museum Catalogue: Z1460 ).

Digital Object – Online sources. (search arkive.org for more variations).

Physical Object borrowed from non UCL Museum collection. Available to view ( At Pittsburgh Zoo, among many others).

The Mole People

The idea of ‘Mole People’ living underground is both urban folklore and reality. In Film and Television, they are usually appear as monster-like creatures.

The Mole People myth is thought to stem from urban myths. The are a number of video’s, articles and books on the subject suggest this is an American phenomenon, that occurs in particular within New York but also other large cities such as Las Vegas and Chicago. As shown in this short film ‘Tunnel People’ by Journeyman Pictures (2011).

Jennifer Toth wrote a book on the subject in 1993. Her claims have been contested by some since (here is a link to just one).

Physical Object borrowed from non UCL Museum collection. Available to view (Toth’s book is here in the British Library).

Digital Object – Online sources.

Physical Object available to view/buy.

Mole Feet Amulets

These two mole’s feet were carried in a pocket as an amulet to protect from toothache, collected in England (around 1933). They are part of the Pitt Rivers Museum. For much more details on this object and to see related objects please visit their online catalogue.

Image credit: Wellcome Library, London. Wellcome Images

Digital Object – Online sources.

Physical Object borrowed from non UCL Museum collection. Available to view (Here in the Pitt Rivers Museum Catalogue).

Cooking with Moles

Mole sauce does not contain any mole. Indeed, it is generally stated that moles do not make good food; check out this blog by ediblegeography.com.

Mole Sauce is the generic name for a number of sauces originally used in Mexican cuisine, as well as for dishes based on these sauces. It comes in a variety of colours with a variety of ingredients. It is derived from Spanish and comes from Nahuatl mōlli: “sauce”.

Here are some recipes.

Black Bean Mole Burgers.

Tequila-Marinated Chicken with Mexican Mole Sauce
Recipe courtesy of Emeril Lagasse
SHOW:The Essence of Emeril
EPISODE: Essence of Chocolate

“How to make Mole sauce’. By The Frugal Chef

Digital Objects – Online sources.

Moledom

 

Moledom is the name of the community of moles within the series  Duncton Chronicles written about by William Horwood. Here, as with ‘Wind in the Willows‘ the moles are given human elements (speech and faith for example) although unlike ‘Wind in the Willows’, they are limited to the physical behaviours of their real-world burrow-dwelling counterparts and neither wear clothing nor exhibit any special technological aptitude.

The author provides much more information about Moledom on this website.

This is an image of the American edition. Illustrator Unknown.

 Digital Object – Online sources.

Physical Object borrowed from non UCL Museum collection. Available to view at The British Library)

Physical Object available to view/buy.

The Star Nosed Mole.

The image came from here. (from ‘The Animal House: Anatomy Counts’)

Online these unusual little creatures don’t have many friends, often begin called ugly.

For more information about how the moles ‘see’ through their noses check out Smithsonian.com

This video is from Arkivr.org. full video credits are available on this page.

The head and jaw of one of these can be found in the Cambridge Museum of Zoology (UMZC No.E.5371.D)

Digital Objects – Online sources (search arkive.org for more variants).

Physical Object borrowed from non UCL Museum collection. Available to view (Here in the Cambridge Museum of Zoology (UMZC No.E.5371.D) ).

Mr. Mole and Mole Hill

Wind and the Willows is possibly one of the most famous English story’s that features a mole. It was originally produced as a book written by Kenneth Grahame and published by Methuen in 1908 and since then a number of abridged versions have been published by many. More details can be found here.

BBC produced a radio version in 1983 read by Bernard Cribbins. This is available to listen to here.

It has been shown on television in a variety of formats including this Thames Television production (1989)

Uploaded to YouTube by feverpitch96 on 11 Jan 2010.

This is the opening titles to the 1980s Cosgrove-Hall television series of The Wind In The Willows. The theme tune is sung by Ralph McTell.

Wind in the Willows is current inception is as a theatre production by Royal Opera House.

The Vaudeville Theatre play at the Royal Opera House is available to see until the end of January 2015. Choreographed and directed by Will Tuckett. Find out more at http://www.roh.org.uk/willows.

Uploaded to You tube by Royal Opera House on 9 Nov 2012.

Physical Object borrowed from non UCL Museum collection. Many versions available to view (here in the British Library).

Physical Object available to view/buy.

Digital Objects – Online sources.