Ussuri Mole

About this species

Range

Northeastern China, the Korean Peninsula and the Russian Far East

The Ussuri mole, Mogera robusta, is a large-bodied member of the mole family Talpidae from Northeast Asia. Older treatments classified it as a subspecies of the Japanese mole, but current mammal catalogues recognize it as a separate species. Its English names include Ussuri mole and large mole. Those taxonomic points are more dependable than superficial field characters, because a burrowing mole is usually detected through earthworks rather than seen well above ground (Wikipedia, general species account; Mammal Diversity Database).

The documented range includes northeastern China, the Korean Peninsula and adjoining parts of the Russian Far East. The species' placement in Mogera identifies it as an eastern Asian mole, but the opened species account supplies too little verified natural-history detail to state Korean diet, breeding schedule, tunnel dimensions or activity pattern. Those fields are deliberately omitted. Records should be identified cautiously because mole hills alone do not establish species and similar fossorial mammals can overlap geographically (Wikipedia, general species account; Mammal Diversity Database).

Description: Wildlife of Korea guide, Wildlife of Everywhere (wildlifeofeverywhere.com); general species information paraphrased from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)