Rare blonde mole surfaces

The animal was discovered while the creatures were being cleared from the island’s grass runway.

It is estimated that only one in 10,000 moles is blonde.

The mole is thought to have leucistic genes rather than be an albino as its eyes were brown rather than pink.

This means it had a partial loss of pigmentation rather than a complete absence of pigmentation, or melanin, which is albinism.

Roland Gauvain, Animal Wildlife Trust manager, said it was the first leucistic mole he had come across.

Its presence means two moles with recessive leucistic genes had interbred.

‘In a small geographical area like Alderney finding one is indicative that there may be more.

‘But because they are subterranean it’s hard to tell what the numbers might be,’ he said.

While Alderney and Jersey have moles, Guernsey does not.

This has been attributed to the different rates at which the islands became detached from Europe by rising sea levels.

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