Mehely's blind mole-rat (''Spalax antiquus'') 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 In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...

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 ...

Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern, and Southeast Europe, Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, S ...

Taxonomy

Previously described in 1909 by

Lajos Méhelÿ Lajos Méhelÿ (August 24, 1862 – February 4, 1953) was a Hungarian zoologist, herpetologist, professor, and prolific author. He is one of the greatest, but also one of the most controversial, personalities in the history of Hungarian zoology ...

as a subspecies of the Balkan mole-rat (''S. graecus''), a 2013 morphological and phylogenetic analysis found it and the Oltenia blind mole-rat (''S. istricus'') to be distinct, well-defined species. It is thought to be the

sister species In phylogenetics, a sister group or sister taxon, also called an adelphotaxon, comprises the closest relative(s) of another given unit in an evolutionary tree. Definition The expression is most easily illustrated by a cladogram: Taxon A and t ...

to ''S. graecus'', and it is thought that the Carpathian Orogeny led to the separation of both species. The

American Society of Mammalogists The American Society of Mammalogists (ASM) was founded in 1919. Its primary purpose is to encourage the study of mammals, and professions studying them. There are over 4,500 members of this society, and they are primarily professional scientists ...

and

IUCN Red List The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species, also known as the IUCN Red List or Red Data Book, founded in 1964, is the world's most comprehensive inventory of the global conservation status of biol ...

follow the results of this study.

Distribution and habitat

This species is restricted to central

, where it is thought to be an endemic species of the

Carpathian Basin The Pannonian Basin, or Carpathian Basin, is a large basin situated in south-east Central Europe. The geomorphological term Pannonian Plain is more widely used for roughly the same region though with a somewhat different sense, with only th ...

. It inhabits

steppe 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, ...

and forest-steppe grasslands on the

Transylvanian Plain The Transylvanian Plain ( ro, Câmpia Transilvaniei; hu, Mezőség, ) is an ethnogeographical area in Transylvania, Romania, located between the Someșul Mare and the Someșul Mic rivers to the north and west and the Mureș River to the south and ...

. Its habitats are largely used as

pasture Pasture (from the Latin ''pastus'', past participle of ''pascere'', "to feed") is land used for grazing. Pasture lands in the narrow sense are enclosed tracts of farmland, grazed by domesticated livestock, such as horses, cattle, sheep, or swine ...

land, although it avoids overgrazed pastures.

Status

This species has suffered a heavy decline in recent decades, and is classified as an

endangered species 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 inv ...

by the IUCN Red List. It is thought to number between 3,550 and 3,800 mature individuals, and may have been extirpated from the southern and southeastern regions of the Transylvanian Plain. The primary threat to this species are the different factors leading to

habitat loss Habitat destruction (also termed habitat loss and habitat reduction) is the process by which a natural habitat becomes incapable of supporting its native species. The organisms that previously inhabited the site are displaced or dead, thereby ...

; most populations only survive in suboptimal habitat due as the heavy cultivation of the most favorable habitats, which are fertile

loess Loess (, ; from german: Löss ) is a clastic, predominantly silt-sized sediment that is formed by the accumulation of wind-blown dust. Ten percent of Earth's land area is covered by loess or similar deposits. Loess is a periglacial or aeolian ...

soils. The most important factor leading to its decline is deep

tillage Tillage is the agricultural preparation of soil by mechanical agitation of various types, such as digging, stirring, and overturning. Examples of human-powered tilling methods using hand tools include shoveling, picking, mattock work, hoein ...

, which prevents the formation of suitable vegetation types and destroys the burrows of this species. In addition, this species is threatened by development and

overgrazing Overgrazing occurs when plants are exposed to intensive grazing for extended periods of time, or without sufficient recovery periods. It can be caused by either livestock in poorly managed agricultural applications, game reserves, or nature res ...

of its habitats.

Climate change In common usage, climate change describes global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes to E ...

may also affect this species, as genetic and fossil evidence indicates that blind mole-rats were historically sensitive to climate fluctuations (prior fluctuations spurred diversification rather than extinction among mole-rats, but there are little to no dispersal capabilities left for mole-rats in the modern day in order to adapt to ongoing changes), but the extent and direction of this impact remains uncertain.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q42900902 Spalax Rodents of Europe Endangered biota of Europe Endemic fauna of Romania Mammals described in 1909 Taxa named by Lajos Méhelÿ