Mole or Vole

I never knew what the difference was between a mole and a vole. As it turned out this was something I needed to know. The other day the kids were playing and they came running up the street saying they caught something. I thought they were just kidding like kids do, but they really had caught something. Unfortunately for the little critter, he was being held captive in the smelly shoe of my daughter. He was small, dark, and furry; and that was about all I could tell from looking in the shoe. The kids got an old fish tank and we dumped the poor creature into it. That was when the question came to my mind whether he was a mole or a vole. I thought I remembered that a mole had a funny octopus looking thing on his nose but then I wasn't sure if that was just a certain kind of mole or whether it was all moles. We watched the animal for quite awhile before the kids got leaves and we headed inside. We were going to let it go that night but they wanted to wait until the next day. Against my better judgment I agreed.

After the kids went to bed I decided to get some pictures and figure out what this little creature was. He was in fact a vole.
Unfortunately, whatever ailment he had that enabled my daughter to catch him, also caused him to die during the night. Poor little vole.