New York’s occurrence record holds 349 star-nosed mole records, and not one of them is an iNaturalist observation. Every entry comes from GBIF’s survey and specimen holdings, which fits an animal that spends almost its whole life underground or underwater and rarely gives a casual observer the chance for a photo.
Adirondack bogs, Catskill streams, and a Finger Lakes gorge
The top reports come from Adirondack Park’s wet conifer flats, Catskill Park’s stream corridors, and Watkins Glen State Park’s fast-running Finger Lakes gorge, three places that share the one thing this mole actually needs: saturated soil close to moving or standing water. Its tunnels often open straight into a stream or pond, and a mole that can’t find that wet, diggable ground simply isn’t there, no matter how much forest surrounds it.
A nose built like a set of fingertips
Twenty-two fleshy rays ring the star-nosed mole’s nostrils, each one dense with touch receptors, and the animal taps them against soil, leaf litter, and open water fast enough to identify prey almost instantly. That sensory speed lets it hunt worms, insects, and small aquatic creatures both above and below the surface, using a dense water-resistant coat and a long, fat-storing tail built for a life spent as much in water as on land.
Status in New York
NatureServe ranks the star-nosed mole S5, secure, and it’s native to New York; USGS NAS doesn’t list it as an introduced species in the state.
