And People Say I'm Expensive.....

[Matt 160]

Have a read;

 

http://www.thisisexeter.co.uk/Mole-catcher-lands-rare-albino/story-18936004-detail/story.html#axzz2SpQut6yX

 

 

Not sure about claiming to have caught 'hundreds of thousands' either......

[snakey 4]

Have a read;

 

http://www.thisisexeter.co.uk/Mole-catcher-lands-rare-albino/story-18936004-detail/story.html#axzz2SpQut6yX

 

 

Not sure about claiming to have caught 'hundreds of thousands' either......

I have never met a farmer willing to pay £16 per mole, hundreds of thousands! you do the maths.

[Matt 160]

Funnily enough Snakey, I met a farmer last week who had been paying a guy £16 per mole plus travel expenses......

 

The end came when he pranged the farmers truck which he also insisted on borrowing to check his traps.

 

He's now quite happy with me turning up and charging my normal farm rate.

[Hot Meat 3,109]

That's madness

[Steve Albano 21]

OK, let's do the math....

 

By "hundreds of thousands" he must mean a minimum of 200,000 moles, divided by the 33 years he's been in business, divided by 365 days a year would come out to 16.6 moles per day. So a little more if he doesn't work weekends. That's doable--I think we do more than that per day, but have only been at it for 20 years.

 

And 16.6 moles per day times L16 each would be L265 per day, which is pretty good money, but again, not impossible in this business. Whether he could get a British Farmer to pay that is another story, I have no idea.

[Matt 160]

Thing is, that story is littered with falsehoods.

 

He may have caught his first mole 33 years ago (I caught mine 35 years ago), but he sure as hell hasn't been in business that long, and has only been trapping professionally for a few years.

 

He's been trading for less than 15 years, and for most of that time didn't trap on farms.

 

The £16 per mole seems to be the going rate amongst some down there. I know SwanseaJack and myself charge more than most, but it's still nowhere near that figure.

[Ideation 8,217]

That's 3million 200'000 quid over 30 years if he has caught 200'000 at that rate. Not bad.

[Lab 10,979]

Have you ever been interviewed for an article?......they just ask you to answer questions and then they go away and write up the story. He's probably reading it himself thinking "What a load of shite" but it wont do his rep' any harm. Tax man might be his next visitor though....

[Matt 160]

I wondered that myself Lab.

 

Let's assume the Journo asks, "so how many moles do you catch each day"

 

The answer may have been something like "on a good day I may catch 50".

 

Journo then goes and does some arithmetic, 50 x 365 days = 18250 which would still be good going....

 

It's the same with the 33 years nonsense.

 

"When did you start trapping moles?"

 

"I caught my first one aged fifteen"

 

"So you're now 48 and you've been a mole trapper for 33 years".

 

 

 

I still think he's laid it on thick to suit his own needs mind you.

[Cliff Ray 185]

Until I read that and discovered you could sell dead moles I thought I had done well with the one a cat killed hen I was 16.

 

All the girls on the bus to school thought it was delightful and kissed and stoked it right up until they realised it was real

[Bosun11 537]

Matt, the biggest 'fib' in the story is that his name ain't Dave Archer... It's Mike Read....(look again!)

[Matt 160]

Matt, the biggest 'fib' in the story is that his name ain't Dave Archer... It's Mike Read....(look again!)

 

Damn it! I've got that picture of Frank wearing nothing but a revolving bow tie in my head now..........

[paulus 26]

For keeping the local church and graveyard mole free. IM told "I will be assured of a place in heaven"

[3175darren 1,102]

I dont know where I read it, but doesn't catching a white mole mean he is about to turn his toes up, according to the old boy's tales anyway,

[C Hall 552]

To me it reads like the reporter has jazzed the story up to sound better as they quite often do