Insular mole
species of mammal
The insular mole (Mogera insularis) is a species of mammal in the family Talpidae. It is restricted to Hainan Island and Taiwan, where it is also known as the Formosan blind mole. The species was first described by Robert Swinhoe in 1863.
Taxonomy
La Touche's mole (M. latouchei) of mainland China and northern Vietnam was formerly considered conspecific with M. insularis until a 2007 taxonomic analysis found it to be a distinct species. In addition, the same study found that populations of M. insularis in the mountainous center and western lowlands of Taiwan represented a new, distinct species, Kano's mole (M. kanoana). The same study also treated the Hainan population as a distinct species (M. hainana) for the sake of comparing geographic variation, but did not do genetic analysis on it and thus later authorities have not followed through with hainana as a distinct species. However, a 2021 genetic analysis found hainana to likely represent a distinct species, leaving insularis as endemic to only Taiwan.
Phylogenetic evidence supports it being the sister species to a clade comprising kanoana and hainana (if the latter is considered a distinct species).
Characteristics
Mogera insularis is unique from other moles in the Talpinae family in that it has 32 chromosomes instead of 34 to 38 chromosomes. Additionally, Mogera insularis members also have a metacentric chromosome pair that is much larger than its other chromosome markers.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Insular mole” as species of mammal. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the science & nature register because the source frames it as species of mammal. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Datasets, specimens, observations and peer-reviewed methods provide the appropriate test for the technical claims summarized here. The source revision retrieved here is dated Oct 4, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q1766202. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1863, 2007 and 2021.
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This entry incorporates text from “Insular mole” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.