The sandy blind mole-rat (''Spalax arenarius'') is an

endangered An endangered species is a species that is very likely to become extinct in the near future, either worldwide or in a particular political jurisdiction. Endangered species may be at risk due to factors such as habitat loss, poaching and inva ...

species of

rodent Rodents (from Latin , 'to gnaw') are mammals of the order Rodentia (), which are characterized by a single pair of continuously growing incisors in each of the upper and lower jaws. About 40% of all mammal species are rodents. They are na ...

in the family

Spalacidae The Spalacidae, or spalacids, are a family of rodents in the large and complex superfamily Muroidea. They are native to eastern Asia, the Horn of Africa, the Middle East, and southeastern Europe. It includes the blind mole-rats, bamboo rats, mole ...

. It is

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

. It was first identified by Evdokia Reshetnik in 1939.

Distribution and habitat

It is restricted to a very small region of southern Ukraine, on sandy habitats along the lower

Dnieper River } The Dnieper () or Dnipro (); , ; . is one of the major transboundary rivers of Europe, rising in the Valdai Hills near Smolensk, Russia, before flowing through Belarus and Ukraine to the Black Sea. It is the longest river of Ukraine and B ...

on the

Black Sea The Black Sea is a marginal mediterranean sea of the Atlantic Ocean lying between Europe and Asia, east of the Balkans, south of the East European Plain, west of the Caucasus, and north of Anatolia. It is bounded by Bulgaria, Georgia, Roma ...

coastal plain. It inhabits moderately wet, sandy soils with low subterranean waters, in

steppes In physical geography, a steppe () is an ecoregion characterized by grassland plains without trees apart from those near rivers and lakes. Steppe biomes may include: * the montane grasslands and shrublands biome * the temperate grasslands, ...

dominated by absinth-grass or absinth-spurge, with sparse vegetation otherwise. It does not inhabit dry feathergrass steppe or moving sands. Sandy mole-rat activity

Status

Only about 15,000 to 20,000 mature individuals are thought to exist. The primary segment of the population inhabits the

Black Sea Biosphere Reserve The Black Sea Biosphere Reserve ( uk, Чорноморський біосферний заповідник) is a biosphere reserve of Ukraine that is located at littoral zone of the northern Black Sea coast covering regions of the Kherson and My ...

, and is thought to have a stable population trend. However, populations outside of this protected area are thought to be declining. The primary threat to this species is habitat conversion by the

afforestation Afforestation is the establishment of a forest or stand of trees (forestation) in an area where there was no previous tree cover. Many government and non-governmental organizations directly engage in afforestation programs to create forests a ...

of the sandy soils for stabilization and wood production.

References

* Spalax Rodents of Europe Endemic fauna of Ukraine Mammals described in 1939 Taxonomy articles created by Polbot {{muroid-stub