Zoologists from the Natural Sciences Faculty of Kosice's Pavol Jozef Šafárik University (UPJS), in cooperation with the Slovak Caves Administration in Liptovský Mikuláš (Žilina region), have discovered three new species of cave animals living in Slovakia, TASR learnt on Thursday from UPJS spokesperson Jaroslava Oravcova. “They are small representatives of wingless insects from the subclass of springtails,” said Ľubomír Kovač, head of the zoology department of UPJS Biology and Ecology-related Sciences at the Faculty of Natural Sciences.
The names of the new species are Megalothorax hipmani, Megalothorax carpaticus and Megalothorax tatricus. Kovač explained that the collection of cave creatures is rather demanding due to their miniature body size of some half a millimetre. The shape of their bodies, with visibly elongated legs, indicates that the animals are well-adapted to the living conditions in caves (temperatures between 5-10 degrees Celsius, remarkably high humidity and limited food resources) and they wouldn't survive in another environment. Furthermore, their body is covered with sensory hair that substitutes for vision. In addition, their legs are equipped with small elongated claws, which facilitate easier locomotion on the slippery cave walls and water surface. The newly-discovered springtails live on cave microorganisms, mainly microscopic fungi, and are themselves a part of the cave food chain.
