A salamander isolated for thousands of years
Shaped by thousands of years living in darkness, this strange creature has lost its eyes, its pigmentation and the use of its legs. 😮 Meet the Texas blind salamander.
An animal cut off from the world for thousands of years…
Living in a dark place with little oxygen or food…What would that animal look like? Like this.
This is Eurycea rathbuni, or the Texas blind salamander. It’s called a troglobite, a species that lives exclusively in caves. Like other troglobites, it only exists in an extremely specific and isolated environment.
This salamander is only found in one place on Earth: a network of caves near the city of San Marcos, Texas. These dark, underwater caves have had a major impact on this salamander’s evolution. It has lost all its pigmentation, making its body look translucent and revealing the blood circulating inside. The blood is especially visible near its external gills, which allow it to obtain all the oxygen it needs while staying underwater.
This aquatic lifestyle has also caused its legs to atrophy, since they no longer need to support its body weight. More remarkably, it has lost its eyes over time, they’re now reduced to two black spots. To compensate, it detects its prey using its highly sensitive skin, which can detect water movement. In its isolated environment, it’s at the top of the food chain, feeding mainly on small shrimp. To determine the sex of its congeners in order to reproduce, it uses chemical signals.
But since these signals must travel through water, the already limited population of this salamander is made very fragile by any pollution in its environment. For this reason, it is considered federally endangered and measures are taken to protect the water sources flowing into its habitat.
Brut.
24 comments
Venkataraman S.
a dayWow great survival theory of Darwin
Muhammad T.
a dayWell
Dev A.
a dayMeet the people who vote for bigotry. They have the exact same features.
Manu G.
a dayAnother cave species found in India during election with no brain.
Mujahid A.
a dayThis thing has many similarities to a typical Indian Voter. 🤣
Naushad A.
2 daysI think Brut should come meghalaya to document about caves recently world longest cave found in meghalaya it is about 24km long Krem puri -mawsynram Meghalaya (India)
Jasheela A.
2 daysPerfect example of Darwin’s theory of evolution..😊
Bah B.
2 daysBrut please come to North East(Meghalaya) Jaintia District India to witness the dead river
Derek M.
11/01/2020 05:40By the description in the beginning I thought it was going to be Joe Biden.
Aroti B.
08/17/2020 15:39Wow amazing
Nima T.
08/10/2020 14:03There're blind fishes found in cave networks of Meghalaya in North-east India. Does Brut know this??
Hans Z.
08/09/2020 14:23This is me for sure.
Rajiv S.
08/09/2020 14:13U should also mention size and approx hiw much it weighs..
Pwyngam P.
08/09/2020 11:55Axylotl methinks.
Ariel F.
08/09/2020 09:50💚
Donna B.
08/09/2020 09:41😲😲😲😲😲 learn something new everyday 🤷👍
Donna W.
05/07/2020 09:54More strange living creatures that hail from Texas! 😋
Lindsay G.
05/05/2020 15:18Can we start an experiment of how well politicians would adapt?
Kieran N.
05/04/2020 08:11feel like you'd enjoy
Carly A.
03/25/2020 07:48Evolution is an amazing thing