CAPE DUNE MOLE-RAT TRAIL
Monday 15 August, 2016
1
MAP:
Distance covered: about 6,9 KM.
2
PROFILE:
This looks far worse than what we experienced…
Cape Dune Mole-rat Trail 15 Aug 2016
1
3
GOOGLE EARTH:
4
CAPE DUNE MOLE-RAT:
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Cape dune mole-rat (Bathyergus suillus) is a species of solitary burrowing rodent in the family Bathyergidae. It is endemic to South Africa and named for the
Cape of Good Hope.
Description
The Cape dune mole-rat is the largest of all the blesmols, measuring 27 to 35 centimetres in head-body length, with a short, 3 to 4 centimetres tail. Males are
generally much heavier than females, weighing anything from 570 to 1,350 grams, compared with typical female weights of 590 to 970.
Both sexes are sturdy, large-bodied rodents, with blunt snouts, cylindrical torsos and short limbs. The forefeet are heavily adapted for digging, with powerful
curved claws. To enable to move more quickly through tight tunnels, the body has few visible external features; for example, there are no pinnae or scrotum, and
the penis retracts into a concealed sheath. Lip-like flaps of skin are able to close behind the incisors, preventing soil from falling into the mouth. The eyes are
small, but not permanently closed.
Unlike its relative the naked mole-rat, the Cape dune species has a thick pelt of soft fur over its entire body. It is cinnamon-brown with greyish underparts, and
few, if any markings. Like other blesmols, the Cape dune mole rat has a relatively low body temperature for its size, of about 35 °C, and is not able to tolerate cold
weather above ground.
Distribution and habitat
The Cape dune mole-rat is found only in South Africa, where it is found along the southern and western shores roughly between Vanrhynsdorp and Port Elizabeth.
Its natural habitat is sandy shorelines and river banks dominated by veldt grassland, sedges, and herbs.
Cape Dune Mole-rat Trail 15 Aug 2016
2
Diet and behaviour
Like all mole-rats, this species is strictly herbivorous. Their diet consists largely of grass and sedges pulled down into the burrow by the roots, although they also
eat bulbs and tubers from local plants such as Albuca and cape tulips. Since they almost never travel above ground, they are neither clearly nocturnal or diurnal,
and may be active at any time of the day, although their peak activity seems to be during the afternoon.
Unusually for a blesmol, the Cape dune mole-rat is not a social animal, with each individual having its own, isolated, burrow system. While most other blesmols
dig through soil using their large, chiselling incisor teeth, the loose, sandy soil of their native environment makes this approach less effective for Cape dune molerats, which instead dig primarily with their claws, kicking the sand behind their bodies and eventually pushing it up to the surface as a molehill. The burrows are
entirely sealed, with no access to the surface, and stretch for between 50 and 420 metres, over an area of around 0.27 hectares. A single mole rat has been
estimated to be able to excavate up to 500 kilograms of soil in a month, under ideal conditions.
Such burrows consist of numerous tunnels that the mole rat uses to search for food, and a few, deeper chambers used for nesting, food storage, and as latrines.
Most tunnels are between 35 and 65 centimetres below ground, but there are often a few blind-ending passages running as deep as 2 metres, into which the
animal retreats to escape from mole snakes and other predators, blocking the tunnel behind itself as it does so. The burrows are protected from extremes of
weather, and are constantly humid and hypoxic.
5
SOME PICS:
Cape Dune Mole-rat Trail 15 Aug 2016
3
The trail name clearly demonstrated ...
Cape Dune Mole-rat Trail 15 Aug 2016
4
Cape Dune Mole-rat Trail 15 Aug 2016
5