Abstract
Bermuda is an Eocene age volcanic island in the western North Atlantic, entirely capped by Pleistocene eolian limestone. The oldest and most highly karstified limestone is a 2 km2 outcrop of the Walsingham Formation containing most of the island’s 150+ caves. Extensive networks of submerged cave passageways, flooded by saltwater, extend under the island. In the early 1980s, cave divers initially discovered an exceptionally rich and diverse anchialine community inhabiting deeper sections of the caves. The fauna inhabiting caves in the Walsingham Tract consists of 78 described species of cave-dwelling invertebrates, including 63 stygobionts and 15 stygophiles. Thus, it represents one of the world’s top hotspots of subterranean biodiversity. Of the anchialine fauna, 65 of the 78 species are endemic to Bermuda, while 66 of the 78 are crustaceans. The majority of the cave species are limited in their distribution to just one or only a few adjacent caves. Due to Bermuda’s high population density, water pollution, construction, limestone quarries, and trash dumping produce severe pressures on cave fauna and groundwater health. Consequently, the IUCN Red List includes 25 of Bermuda’s stygobiont species as critically endangered.
Highlights
Bermuda is a small, mid-Atlantic island located 1050 km off the east coast of the United States in the Sargasso Sea, at 32◦20 N, 64◦45 W. It lies approximately equidistant by air from Boston, New York, and Atlanta, making Bermuda only a short flight away for all of the U.S east coast
At the 1984 International Symposium on the Biology of Marine Cave held in Bermuda, Holthuis’s original definition was expanded and modified to include tidal, saltwater pools inside caves: “Anchialine habitats consist of bodies of haline water, usually with a restricted exposure to open air, always with more or less extensive subterranean connections to the sea, and showing noticeable marine as well as terrestrial influences” [7]
During the 2012 Second International Symposium on Anchialine Ecosystems in Croatia, the term anchialine was more broadly defined as “a tidally-influenced subterranean estuary located within crevicular and cavernous karst and volcanic terrains that extends inland to the limit of seawater penetration” [8]
Summary
Mid-Atlantic island located 1050 km off the east coast of the United States in the Sargasso Sea, at 32◦20 N, 64◦45 W. It lies approximately equidistant by air from Boston, New York, and Atlanta, making Bermuda only a short flight away for all of the U.S east coast. The Spanish explorer Juan de Bermudez discovered these isolated islands in 1505, he did not try to land Ten years later, he returned to Bermuda, leaving behind a dozen pigs and sows for any castaways who might become stranded there. The expedition’s commander, Captain George Nares, took the opportunity to explore Paynter’s Vale (a.k.a. Church) Cave, accompanied by the British Governor of Bermuda, Sir John Henry Lefroy. Nares rowed the governor across a lake at the bottom of the cave, remarking on “a slight change of level with the tide, sufficient to keep the water perfectly pure” [4]
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