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A troglobite (or, formally, troglobiont) is an animal species, or population of a species, strictly bound to underground habitats, such as caves.These are separate from species that mainly live in above-ground habitats but are also able to live underground (eutroglophiles), and species that are only cave visitors (subtroglophiles and trogloxenes). [1]
Cave environments fall into three general categories: Endogean; the parts of caves that are in communication with surface soils through cracks and rock seams, groundwater seepage, and root protrusion. Parahypogean; the threshold regions near cave mouths that extend to the last penetration of sunlight. Hypogean; or "true" cave environments.
Cave-inhabiting animals are often categorized as troglobites (cave-limited species), troglophiles (species that can live their entire lives in caves, but also occur in other environments), trogloxenes (species that use caves, but cannot complete their life cycle fully in caves) and accidentals (animals not in one of the previous categories).
Ecological classification or ecological typology is the classification of land or water into geographical units that represent variation in one or more ecological features. . Traditional approaches focus on geology, topography, biogeography, soils, vegetation, climate conditions, living species, habitats, water resources, and sometimes also anthropic factors.
Caves that are close to the surface, such as lava tubes, often have tree roots hanging from the cave roof, which provide nutrients for sap-feeding insects. [1] [2] Other important food sources in underground habitats are animals being decomposed and bat guano, [3] [4] [5] that creates large invertebrate communities in such caves. [6] [7]
This is a list of terrestrial ecoregions as compiled by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF). The WWF identifies terrestrial, freshwater, and marine ecoregions. The terrestrial scheme divides the Earth's land surface into 8 biogeographic realms, containing 867 smaller ecoregions.
Some can leave caves for short periods, and may complete parts of their life cycles above ground, but cannot live their entire lives outside of a cave environment. Examples include chemotrophic bacteria, some species of flatworms , springtails , and cavefish .
The BEC system is used by resource managers in British Columbia to assist them with the management of natural ecosystems for forestry, conservation, and wildlife, [5] The system was initially developed to determine, on a site-specific basis, the ecologically suitable tree species for regeneration after forest harvesting. [19]