Aardvark

A one-of-a-kind order

The aardvark is the only living species in the entire order Tubulidentata — a mammalian evolutionary line with no close living relatives. Its nearest relatives are elephants, manatees, hyraxes, and tenrecs (in the superorder Afrotheria), but the shared ancestry is very ancient.

The name comes from Afrikaans: aardvark = “earth pig.” The scientific name means “earth-burrowing foot.”

The digging machine

An aardvark can dig a 1-meter burrow in 5 minutes, using shovel-shaped claws on four powerful feet. They use this speed to escape from predators — repeatedly sinking into the ground faster than a lion or leopard can pursue.

Over a lifetime, a single aardvark creates dozens of burrows across its range. These abandoned burrows become critical habitat for other species — warthogs, porcupines, wild dogs, hyenas, monitor lizards, and various snakes all rely on aardvark excavations for shelter.

The tongue

The aardvark’s sticky, muscular tongue can extend 30 cm. It consumes up to 50,000 ants and termites per night, lapping them up from mounds it has broken open or excavated from underground passages.

Uniquely, aardvark teeth have no enamel and no central pulp — they’re composed entirely of dentine with many fine parallel tubules running through them, which gives the order its name (tubulidentata = “tube teeth”).

Aardvark cucumber

One plant, Cucumis humifructus, sets fruit underground — an extremely rare trait in plants. The only animal known to dig it up and disperse its seeds is the aardvark. This plant is entirely dependent on the aardvark for reproduction, making it one of the most specific plant-animal mutualism relationships in nature.