Star-Nosed Mole
The star-nosed mole is an amazing little creature. Its most noticeable feature is the 22 fleshy tentacle-like appendages, forming a little star, at the end of its nose. Your first thought might be that these tentacles help the mole to smell, but you’d be wrong. They function more like an eye than a nose. The tentacles or rays are covered with more than 25,000 incredibly sensitive touch receptors called Eimer’s organs. These organs contain over 100,000 nerve fibers making these rays the most sensitive touch organ of any mammal. This little mole has poor eyesight; instead it uses its tactile rays to “see” its world and find food.
The preferred habitat of the star-nosed mole is wetlands near streams, lakes and swamps. The soil in these locations is soft making it easier to dig tunnels for moving around and foraging, and deeper chambers for sleeping and nesting. These guys are built for digging with their short necks, strong shoulders and big feet and claws. They’re also built for swimming and diving. The star-nosed mole is the only semi-aquatic mole in the world. They have a dense waterproof coat, their big feet act like paddles, their long tail acts like a rudder, and they have twice the lung capacity of other moles. They spend more time foraging in water than on land. In fact, many of their tunnels open under the surface of a stream or lake. They’ve even been seen swimming under the ice in winter. If this isn’t amazing enough, these moles can even smell underwater. They blow bubbles out their noses then inhale the same bubbles which have now captured surrounding odors allowing the mole to follow scent trails.
Star-nosed moles are voracious eaters – consuming 50% or more of their body weight every day. It actually holds the Guinness World Record for the fastest easting mammal. It can identify food as edible, capture it, eat it and begin searching for the next pieces of food in 230 milliseconds – that’s a little more than one-fifth of a second. That’s fast!
Star-nosed moles are crepuscular/nocturnal, meaning they’re most active during twilight and at night, although you might catch a glimpse of one during the day. The star-nosed mole is an important part of wetland ecosystems. It is food for a number of prey animals including big and small owls, red-tailed hawks (during the day), skunks, weasels, fishers, minks, bullfrogs and largemouth bass. It’s a predator, above ground or underground the star-nosed mole will eat such things as worms, grubs, beetles and other invertebrates and in the water, he likes aquatic insects, mollusks, amphibians and small fish. By tunneling through moist ground these moles provide oxygen to the roots of plants that might otherwise be trapped in compacted soil with no oxygen. Let’s help these amazing little moles by turning off all unnecessary lights at night so they can have the dark nighttime environment they need to thrive and continue as an important member of their ecosystem.