Life in the Dark: 5 Animals Thriving Without Eyesight

• Texas blind salamander, a rare amphibian, lives in dark underground aquifers and uses water currents and chemical cues to locate prey.
• The star-nosed mole, despite tiny eyes, relies on its star-shaped nose with thousands of sensory receptors for rapid prey identification.
• Blind cave fish, found in underground caves, are born with eyes that degenerate, using a lateral line system to detect vibrations.
• Caecilians are limbless amphibians with reduced eyes, using specialized sensory tentacles near their snout to find prey in soil.
• The Kauaʻi cave wolf spider, an eyeless spider from Hawaii's lava tubes, hunts by sensing vibrations and movement.

Why It Matters: These five animals demonstrate remarkable adaptations to thrive and hunt in darkness without functional eyes.