@article {60271, title = {Invertebrates of Dobšiná Ice Cave and Stratená Cave System, Slovak Paradise, Slovakia}, journal = {Slovenský Kras: Acta Carsologica Slovaca}, volume = {58}, year = {2020}, pages = {69-96}, abstract = {

So far, 262 invertebrate taxa have been identified in the entire Straten\á Cave System, 91 of which occupy Dob\šin\á Ice Cave. Individual entrances to the system are situated on slopes covered by a mountain spruce forest. The parietal fauna of the entrance sections of the Straten\á and Psie diery Caves consists of a rich dipteran community. The collapsed doline at the entrance of Dob\šin\á Ice Cave represents a peculiar microclimatically inverse habitat inhabited by cold-adapted species of soil fauna. The shallow soil profile at the entrance of Dob\šin\á Ice Cave is occupied by recently discovered Collembola species Megalothorax dobsinensis. Its existence is exclusively limited to the cold and wet parts of the entrance microclimatic gradient. The cave sections filled permanently with glaciers are the poorest in terms of species diversity, with only 4 invertebrate species recorded. Collembola Deuteraphorura kratochvili and Protaphorura janosik are Carpathian endemics. P. janosik is characteristic of the entire cave system, occasionally with higher population density on the ice surface. Unglaciated parts of the Straten\á Cave System represent an environment with a more microclimatic balanced regime with an air temperature between 3\–6 \°C. These parts are the habitat of troglobiotic and eutroglophilic invertebrates such as mite Pantelozetes cavaticus and Cyrtolaelaps mucronatus, collembolans Pygmarrhopalites aggtelekiensis and Megalothorax carpaticus, isopod Mesoniscus graniger and diplopod Allorhiscosoma sphinx. The Straten\á Cave is the locus typicus of troglobiotic mite Foveacheles troglodyta (family Rhagidiidae). The cave system is also rich in standing water habitats. Due to its macroscopic dimensions, Niphargus tatrensis is the most striking stygobiotic crustacean in the Straten\á Cave System. Other typical representatives of the aquatic fauna are minute crustaceans Elaphoidella sp. and Bathynella natans occupying pools in unglaciated parts of the Dob\šin\á Ice Cave. The presence of highly adapted terrestrial and aquatic cave invertebrates, some of them classified as glacial relicts, indicates the stable environmental conditions of the Dob\šin\á Ice Cave despite its long-term exploitation as a tourist cave.

}, author = {Vladimír Papáč and Vladimír Košel and Ľubomír Kováč and Peter Ľuptáčik and Andrej Mock and Andrea Parimuchová and Natália Raschmanová and Zuzana Višňovská} }