科學家發現了7年來從未遷出的野生Sal

科學家發現了7年來從未遷出的野生Sal

In the depths of a European cave, dwells what must be the laziest and most underwhelming of all creatures to have ever been called a dragon. With disturbingly fleshy-coloured skin, it has also earned the label of "human fish".

在歐洲一個洞穴的深處,棲息著有史以來被稱為龍的所有生物中最懶惰、最平淡無奇的東西。它有著令人不安的肉色皮膚,也贏得了“人類魚”的標籤。

But the olm (Proteus anguinus), with its cute stubby limbs, is actually an amphibian - a type of salamander that has adapted to life in the eternal darkness of a skyless existence.

但是奧姆(Proteus Anguinus),有著可愛的粗短的四肢,實際上是一種兩棲動物-一種適應了在無天空的永恆黑暗中生活的蠑螈。

This troglobite lifestyle has resulted in under-developed eyes covered by layers of skin, which led Charles Darwin to refer to the species as "wrecks of ancient life".

這種熱帶雨林的生活方式導致眼睛不發達,被層層皮膚覆蓋,這導致查爾斯·達爾文將這種物種稱為“古代生命的殘骸”。

Olm eyes can only detect the presence of light, but not much else.

OLM眼睛只能探測到光的存在,但不能偵測到其他的東西。

Thus, these little gill-adorned weirdos are essentially blind, but they make up for this with a keen sense of smell, underwater hearing, and the ability to detect movements in their watery home.

因此,這些用鰓裝飾的小怪獸本質上是盲人,但他們用敏銳的嗅覺、水下聽覺和探測水中家的運動的能力彌補了這一點。

Between 2010 and 2018, researchers captured, tagged, and recaptured a number of olms in the caves of eastern Bosnia-Herzegovina. Based on the frequency of their encounters, they estimated there were 26 adult olms making themselves at home there; across these eight years, checking in on their research subjects revealed the animals had a rather limited movement range.

2010年至2018年間,研究人員在波斯尼亞-黑塞哥維那東部的洞穴中捕獲、標記並重新捕獲了一些OLM。根據它們相遇的頻率,他們估計有26只成年OLM在那裡過得很舒服;在這八年中,檢查他們的研究對象時發現,這些動物的活動範圍相當有限。

"The majority of recaptured individuals moved less than 10 metres (33 feet) during several years," wrote zoologist Gergely Balázs from Eötvös Loránd University and colleagues in their paper.

來自Eötvös Loránd大學的動物學家Gergely Balázs和他的同事在他們的論文中寫道:“大多數被捕獲的個體在幾年內移動了不到10米(33英尺)。”

One of these individuals was even lazier than the rest.

其中一個人甚至比其他人更懶。

It was found in the exact same spot a crazy 2,569 days after it was first recorded.

在第一次被記錄下來的2569天后,人們在同一個地方發現了它。

That's over seven years! But there are clues in olm biology that might explain this seemingly unbelievable feat.

七年多了!但是在OLM生物學中有一些線索可以解釋這一看似難以置信的壯舉。

(Javier Ábalos Alvarez/Flickr/CC BY SA 2.0)

(JavierÁBalos Alvarez/Flickr/CC by SA 2.0)

These little slackers have a lifespan of up to a century.

這些小懶蟲的壽命長達一個世紀。


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