Moles can smell underwater.

The star-nosed mole has an undeniably peculiar nose, with a snout ending in a ring of 22 fleshy, tactile tentacles packed with touch sensors. This nasal star is the tiny creature’s most distinctive feature, and it has a pretty incredible ability: detecting scents while underwater. 

Trying to inhale water is a very bad idea for mammals, but these semi-aquatic moles have circumvented that problem by blowing out small air bubbles from their nostrils onto objects or scent trails. The mole then quickly sucks the bubble back in, effectively “sniffing” the captured scents. They’ve been observed performing this bubble-blowing and re-inhaling sequence several times per second. It’s an ingenious adaptation that lets them forage in watery environments where ordinary sniffing would be impossible.