Swiftlet 1 Cave

Herbert Daniel Gebauer - 06/01/2018

A northwest-facing cave entrance, up to 5 m wide, gives access to a partly daylight-lit entrance chamber (triangular in ground plan, up to 8 m wide) with a smaller cave entrance in the southwest corner. A continuation from the entrance chamber off northwest (just inside the cave entrance) leads to an aphotic inner part of the cave, which was characterised on 2nd September 2013 by a day roost of bats resulting in a guano covered cave floor. SITUATION: On North Andaman Island and in the vicinity of the island's highest mountain (Saddle Peak N13°09': E093°01': 730 m), in the forest near the village of Kalighat an on an unidentified hillock (no name mentioned) with 41 relatively small limestone caves formed due to dissolution by autochthonous (autogenic) precipitation. Apparently absent are streamcave passages shaped by flowing water (note 1). CAVE LIFE: Unspecified bats (Chiroptera) and swiftlets (note 2), the latter perhaps representatives of the Andaman Greyrumped Swiftlet (note ) and, most likely, unsurveyed guano dwellers.A northwest-facing cave entrance, up to 5 m wide, gives access to a partly daylight-lit entrance chamber (triangular in ground plan, up to 8 m wide) with a smaller cave entrance in the southwest corner. A continuation from the entrance chamber off northwest (just inside the cave entrance) leads to an aphotic inner part of the cave, which was characterised on 2nd September 2013 by a day roost of bats resulting in a guano covered cave floor. SITUATION: On North Andaman Island and in the vicinity of the island's highest mountain (Saddle Peak N13°09': E093°01': 730 m), in the forest near the village of Kalighat an on an unidentified hillock (no name mentioned) with 41 relatively small limestone caves formed due to dissolution by autochthonous (autogenic) precipitation. Apparently absent are streamcave passages shaped by flowing water (note 1). CAVE LIFE: Unspecified bats (Chiroptera) and swiftlets (note 2), the latter perhaps representatives of the Andaman Greyrumped Swiftlet (note ) and, most likely, unsurveyed guano dwellers.