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23 October 2026

A mammal with a queen, workers and soldiers sounds like something from a science-fiction story. Yet the naked mole-rat has a social system that brings it surprisingly close to the world of ants and bees.

These small, nearly hairless rodents live underground in colonies, mainly in the dry regions of East Africa. Most mammals do not divide their communities into such sharply defined roles. Naked mole-rats do: one breeding female, known as the queen, produces most of the young, while other colony members help dig tunnels, gather food, care for pups or defend the nest.

Their underground world is organised around narrow passages and chambers. Some members work at extending the tunnels in search of roots and tubers, which provide their food. Others help keep the colony functioning and protect it from threats.

Their unusual social life is not the only surprise. Naked mole-rats can tolerate very low oxygen levels better than most mammals, an advantage in crowded burrows where the air may be poor.

They are still mammals, not insects, and their colony is not identical to a beehive. But they challenge the idea that a mammal community must always revolve around independent parents raising their own young.

Beneath East Africa’s dry ground, an animal that looks almost unfinished has evolved one of the most extraordinary social arrangements in the mammalian world.

Sometimes nature’s strangest designs are not found in the open landscape. They are hidden under our feet.

Rajat Chandra Sarmah, Guwahati, Assam, India, Instagram @rajatchandrasarmah, YouTube: conversewithasmile, email rajatchandrasarmah@gmail.com