European Mole – Talpa europaea – Everything You Need to Know About This Burrowing Mammal

Zoologists classify the mole, Talpa europaea, as an insectivore, grouping it with shrews and hedgehogs. Gardeners, however, see this species as a formidable pest rather than a helpful creature that preys on insects harmful to their plants.

Moles have a widespread distribution and thrive in any loose soil rich in earthworms. Gardens, often full of humus, and meadows are particularly favorable habitats for them.

Moles can be found in varying densities across all types of terrain, from plains to high altitudes, as long as the soil has a top layer of at least 10 cm and isn’t prone to frequent flooding.

Note: Can you spot a mole? Seeing a live mole scurrying across the ground or a road is a rare sight for most of us. This animal, you could say, is built for an underground life, and it exhibits some remarkable adaptations for it.

1.Talpa Europaea: Anatomy of the European Mole

The mole has a seamless body shape, with its head connecting directly to the body without a visible neck—a form perfectly suited to its subterranean lifestyle.

A Mole’s Head

A mole’s head is unique for several reasons. Unlike many other animals, it lacks external ear flaps, which makes it easier to navigate its underground tunnels. This doesn’t mean it has poor hearing; on the contrary, its hearing is excellent. Its ear canal, which opens into the fur, can sometimes be covered by a transparent layer of skin.

A mole’s eyes are very small and often different in size. While it’s often said that moles are blind, their eyes are actually functional, a point we’ll explore later on this page.

The mole’s snout is long and ends in a padded nose supported by a special bone. Its nose is mainly a tactile organ, but it’s very fragile and absolutely cannot be used as a tool to dig tunnels or push dirt out of molehills.

A Mole’s Limbs

The mole’s forelimbs are its most distinctive feature. They are positioned far forward on the body and resemble broad, paddle-like hands that face outward. The fingers are joined almost to the tips of their powerful, flattened claws. A special sickle-shaped bone, the falciform bone, reinforces this entire structure. The rest of the limb—the arm—is completely hidden beneath the skin.

While “hands” is technically the correct term, “powerful and effective shovels” would be a more accurate description of their function.

Note: No messy fur here! The velvety coat of a mole has a remarkable quality: it never gets tangled. This is due to a special jagged texture that keeps the hairs cohesive. The hairs are inserted perpendicular to the skin, creating an effective barrier against dirt and other particles—a much-needed adaptation for the mole’s environment.

A Mole’s Tail

The mole’s tail is short. When moving through its tunnels, it holds the tail upright so it maintains constant contact with the ceiling.

The Size and Weight of Moles

An adult mole measures about 15 to 19 cm, with the tail accounting for 2.5 to 3.5 cm of that length. Its weight is more variable, ranging from 60 to 130 g, though most individuals fall between 80 and 100 g.

Special Lungs

In mole tunnels, oxygen levels are lower than on the surface. To survive in this environment, moles have developed enormous lungs that give them twice the hemoglobin of any other mammal. Since hemoglobin is what transports oxygen in the blood, it’s easy to see how they can live underground for years.

The 5 Senses of Moles

Sight

A mole can see, but it appears to be unable to detect movement. This is a significant disadvantage when it emerges from its tunnels, as predators can easily catch it off guard.

There’s a common misconception that moles fear light. This is not true, and Godet’s experiment from the French Zoological Society is a great example. When a mole was placed in a bare, dark room with a single lit glass tube, it rushed inside, showing that its primary drive is to seek contact with walls, not to avoid light.

Hearing

A mole’s hearing is excellent. The structure of its inner ear is normal, and it can hear sounds in the audible range, and possibly even some ultrasounds. It’s also worth noting that moles react to prolonged ground vibrations, and their sensitivity to sound might be heightened by the fact that their tunnels act as amplifiers. Some writers refer to this as a “stethoscope effect.”

Smell

Moles have a strong sense of smell. Experiments have shown that a mole can detect an immobile earthworm through 7 cm of clay. This sense of smell is what allows it to hunt for food every day through its vast network of underground tunnels.

Touch

Touch seems to be the mole’s most important sense. It has two types of touch organs:

• Eimer’s organ, located at the tip of the snout, which can stiffen to increase its sensitivity.

• Vibrissae (specialized hairs) on the snout, forepaws, and the end of the tail. The vibrissae on the tail may explain its use as a “trolley”, a mechanism that helps transmit current to a motor.

Taste

As for a mole’s sense of taste, it’s a topic that remains unknown. We have no data to confirm whether a mole perceives taste with its tongue, so there’s nothing to discuss.

2.Reproduction in Moles

It is extremely difficult to distinguish between a male and a female Talpa europaea. In general, the sex ratio for this species is close to 1, meaning the number of male moles is roughly equal to the number of females.

Moles are highly territorial and live in isolation for most of their lives. This rule is briefly suspended during the mating season. Males become fertile in late February and remain so for three months. Females become sexually receptive a bit later, in March, and have very short periods of heat.

Ill-timed encounters can lead to fights between moles, while successful matings result in a litter of 1 to 6 newborns (the average is 4) after a gestation period of about 4 weeks. The newborns are naked and bright red, and they are nursed for 4 to 5 weeks. It’s important to remember that a mole is a burrowing mammal, not a rodent.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WNrNiKGSwT4

Their growth is rapid. They weigh 3 to 5 g and are 3.5 to 4 cm long at birth, but grow to 60 g and about 12 cm just three weeks later.

Young moles become independent after 1.5 to 2 months. During this time, they often venture to the surface, making them easy prey for predators. Some females may raise a second litter between June and July, but only a small percentage of them participate in this second reproductive cycle.

A note for trappers: While the species has a sex ratio close to one, the proportion of juveniles to adults varies greatly throughout the year—from 0% in January to 70% in May-June. On average, this results in about 43% young and 57% adults. The natural lifespan of a mole has not been systematically studied, but it is estimated to be about 3 years, with some “centenarians” living up to 5 years. Mortality is very high during the first six months of life, but it decreases after that and seems to be more or less independent of age.

Note: Outside of the mating and birthing seasons, when a female’s vagina is open, it’s difficult to distinguish a male mole from a female. This is why many old-time mole catchers believed that all young moles were male and that 50% of them became female the following spring. Today, the situation has changed… and mole catchers have disappeared.

The Diet of Moles

Many researchers have studied the mole’s diet, allowing us to create a list of potential prey for this animal. In practice, a comparison of these findings shows that moles adapt very well to local conditions, including the types and relative abundance of prey. In general, earthworms are the primary component of their diet, making up 80 to 90%. Other prey include white grubs, wireworms, and various other invertebrates.

However, a crucial point is that moles do not eat inert matter. This fact was once misunderstood and led to attempts at poisoning moles with granule-based baits. While the bait would disappear from the tunnels, experiments on captive moles showed that they would simply transport it without eating it. It’s also possible that other small mammals using the mole tunnels were eating the bait.

This tendency to store food is not random. When the cold season begins, moles can build up reserves of earthworms (and sometimes white grubs). They do this by immobilizing their prey with a bite to the head.

Evans*, in his study of tissue regeneration, proved that the clusters of earthworms found in tunnels or special cavities were not natural gatherings but were deliberately stored by moles. This phenomenon was first noted by Dahl (cited by Evans) back in 1886, who documented a stockpile of 1,224 earthworms and 18 white grubs.

Moles have high energy needs. An 80g mole must consume about 50g of live prey per day (this amount increases in captivity, making them difficult to raise and keep alive). Just a 12-hour fast is enough to be fatal, which explains the frequent activity rhythms well known to those who dig them out.

Their water needs are met by the earthworms they consume, which are 85% water. A mole’s meal follows a particular ritual: it grabs the worm with its paws, then begins eating it from the head. While eating, it applies pressure to the worm’s body, causing it to expel the dirt it has been digesting. You could say a mole is a refined gourmet!

3.Mole Structures and Tunnels

Moles dig their tunnels and clear out the dirt using their forepaws.

They cannot use their sensitive snout or their forehead, as the thin frontal bone would not withstand the pressure. In fact, Fritschy calculated that the weight of the dirt evacuated at one time can be 20 times the mole’s own weight, while the lateral pressure on the tunnel walls can reach 24 times its weight.

This high pressure is a major reason why mole tunnels are so durable. A mole’s average digging speed depends on the type of soil. The most common estimates are 12 to 15 meters per hour, with bursts of speed up to 50 meters during mating season, though these are typically in shallower tunnels.

A mole’s tunnel network is mainly for finding food. These tunnels are generally 10 to 20 centimeters below the surface, but during a drought, they can be as deep as 1.5 meters!

Not all tunnels and molehills are the same; experienced trappers can easily tell them apart. There are three types:

• The main tunnel: Located 20 to 30 cm deep, this is a frequently used passageway, traveled up to 7 times a day.

• Secondary tunnels: These are identified by a scattered pattern of molehills that fan out in different directions. These are the hunting tunnels the mole has dug in your yard. The fewer earthworms your soil has, the more secondary tunnels you’ll see.

• Surface tunnels: These are less obvious but are often found on the surface of the ground. They are made by young moles who lack the strength to dig deeper, or by males during the breeding season. You can spot them by a cracked line running along the surface of the soil.

Note: A record to beat! Skoczen documented an 80g female mole that, in 90 minutes, built four molehills, moving 15.5 kg of dirt—approximately 200 times its own weight. To match that output, a human would have to move over 1.5 tons of dirt in the same amount of time!

4.Identifying Moles vs. Water Voles

To figure out which animal is destroying your garden, the best approach is to carefully observe the molehills and tunnels. The following criteria are well-defined, but in the wild, the distinction isn’t always easy, especially if the constructions aren’t fresh. Be careful not to jump to conclusions—or suffer the practical consequences!

The Molehills

Generally, a water vole’s molehills are flatter than a mole’s. The dirt they throw up is also finer, and upon inspection, you’ll often find plant debris if a water vole is the builder. However, the absence of debris doesn’t automatically rule out a water vole.

The Tunnels

You can improve your chances of identification by checking the tunnel from which the dirt was evacuated. A mole pushes dirt out of a tunnel that usually opens perpendicularly to the ground’s surface, while a water vole’s tunnel opens obliquely.

Typically, a mole’s tunnel has a circular cross-section, while a water vole’s is oval. You must be very careful with this distinction. Remember that while the initial shape is determined by the animal that dug it, other moles and water voles may use the same tunnel later.

Did You Know?

A mole has 44 teeth. These teeth gradually wear down over the years from the abrasion caused by eating prey containing dirt and sand. Since they are crucial for survival, a mole’s total loss of its teeth after 3 to 4 years is the main cause of death.

Moles are particularly voracious, capable of consuming the equivalent of 80% of their body weight every day.

This adds up to an estimated 30 kg of earthworms per year! If you have a compost pile in your garden, it might attract moles since these piles are often rich in worms, a favorite food source. To keep moles out of your yard, it’s a good idea to use raised compost bins.

Also, moles hate drafts. If you remove their molehills with a shovel, creating air currents in the tunnels, the mole will immediately come and block these open passages.

Finally, it’s worth knowing that a mole is an excellent swimmer and can hold its breath for several minutes underwater. This means that filling their tunnels with water will be completely useless for trying to get rid of them.