THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, October 26, 1994 TAG: 9410260041
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Larry Maddry
LENGTH: Medium: 80 lines
THEY CALL HIM ``The Mole Man.''
Tom Jones is the heart and soul of the mole patrol at Sleepy Hole Golf Course.
You'll find him at the course early each morning when the fairway grass is wet with dew.
Hands gripping the wheel of his golf cart, jaw jutting with determination, Tom's keen eyes scan the fairways for the mole passageways that resemble the tunnels Lionel trains run through.
Sometimes the tunnels look as though someone has smuggled a rolling pin under the carpet of fairway grass. ``And sometimes they are a couple of hundred yards long,'' Tom said.
Rattling in the back of the cart is his secret weapon: ``The Terminator.'' The Terminator'' is a pointed-blade shovel, shaft sawed in half. With it, Tom has become for moles what Norman Schwarzkopf was to the Republican Guard.
``The secret is in digging about 6 inches behind the mole, scooping him up and banging him in the head,'' the mole mugger explained.
The technique turns the lights out on a mole in about two seconds, which Tom believes is the only way. The moles he kills don't suffer, he says.
``Poison gets into the groundwater and pollutes,'' Tom said. ``And it takes time for the mole to die. Spring traps are very cruel, the spikes that kill the mole are painful and the mole suffers for many hours sometimes.''
The mole toll at Sleepy Hole since Tom began to swing a shovel better than a three-wood stood at 212 last week. He uses a narrower stance than with a golf club, hands gripping the shovel like a baseball bat as he slams the mole's head with the back of the shovel.
He was clearly on a mole roll last Friday morning, killing three.
Tom, 65, has been golfing at Sleepy Hole since the course opened nearly 20 years ago. But it was only when the moles began digging tunnels resembling huge washboards across the fairways about three years ago that he decided to do something about it.
Since then, golfers say, the mole population has been in noticeable decline. His free services have won the praise of his fellow golfers and the club pro, Jim Armentrout. Armentrout has presented a plaque to Tom with a mole head embedded in its burnished wood.
While Tom's golf game has worsened because of his many hours of mole work - plus a touch of bursitis - his swing with a mole shovel has improved.
So much so that his reputation as a master of mole molestation has spread far and wide. His services have been sought at nearby Portsmouth City Park where he has zonked 68 moles into the great beyond. ``The moles were so bad in the park that the park ranger said kids were tripping over 'em and falling down wherever they went,'' Tom said.
He also nailed 31 moles at Hell's Point course, and 72 at Nansemond River Baptist Church.
No matter how big the man, if he wishes to outwit a four or five-ounce mole he must have patience. And Tom, a former Suffolk businessman, has plenty, waiting for them with his shovel six days a week. He listens: ``You can sometimes hear 'em tearing roots up if you listen close,'' he said. And he watches - for movement in the tunnels. He has developed what you might call a molecular theory.
``Your mole is an earthworm eater,'' he said. ``He's smart and fast but he's pretty dumb to use the same tunnel all the time,'' he said. ``Some people say you can drop a stick of Juicy Fruit gum down there and the mole will die when he eats it cause it will blow up his stomach. That's an old wives' tale, I think.
``Moles will eat three times a day and they come out pretty near the same time every day. . . . They like it after a rain cause it's easier to make the tunnels when the dirt is wet. This is a day when they'll be real busy out there. In about 20 minutes, they'll begin stirring.''
Tom stirred himself 20 minutes later. Eyes glinting with determination beneath his cap, he marched toward the golf car with his trusty Terminator.
Never ask for whom the bell tolls, moles. It tolls for thee. ILLUSTRATION: Color photo by Lawrence Jackson, Staff
Tom Jones works for freee as the mole patrol at Sleepy Hole Golf
Course in Suffolk.
by CNB