Hobbies And Interests
Bats
From 1,000 to 2,000 female Myotis velifer or cave myotis bats come to roost in the Big Room of the cavern to have their pups and care for them beginning in April. They roost during the day and leave their pups in the cave in the evening while leaving the cave to eat insects. The bats have their single pup in June and leave the cavern in mid-September to embark on their annual migration. The bats provide the only link between the cave and the surface ecosystems, with their guano providing the nutrients in the cave to support insect life.
Mites and Spiders
There are 50 to 500 mites in every cubic inch of the cavern studied by scientists, according to the "Journal of Cave and Karst Studies." The 10 identified species of mites are dependent on bat guano deposits for survival. Geolaelaps, a mite that preys on other smaller mites and nematodes, is common in the cavern. Another of the 10 identified mite species is parasitic and spends its larval stage on the camel cricket.
Only one species of spider, Eidmannella pallida, or cave spider, is found in the caverns. This pale yellow spider makes its irregularly-shaped webs in cracks and under rocks. This predator's main food source is mites.
Crickets, Beetles and Scorpions
Cave crickets, also called camel crickets, are brown and look humpbacked. Feeding mainly on plants found outside the cavern at night, this bug takes refuge in the safety of the cave, hiding in its cracks during the daytime. Its eggs and droppings make meals for blind beetles that never leave the cave.
Blind beetles smell cricket eggs which they then dig up and eat using sensors near their mouths. Cave crickets dig false holes that have no eggs to attempt to protect some of their eggs from the beetles.
A variety of scorpions have been found just inside the entrance of Kartchner Caverns. Scorpions have eight legs and a pair of claws. Their tales curve over their backs and contain venom used to kill their prey which includes the cave crickets and blind beetles.
Fossil Record
At one time, the cavern was home to a wide range of animals. Researchers speculate that entrances to the cavern became shut off over the ages, making the cave habitable today only by bats and insects. Paleontologist finds include the skeleton of an 86,000-year-old ground sloth, a horse that is 34,000 years old, a bear, a clam, toad, coyote, a roadrunner, a ringtail and numerous types of rodents.