Krizna jama - Palaeontology, Zoolgy and Geology of KJ in SL

The Križna jama near Lož in Slovenia is one of the biggest and most beautiful caves of the Classic Karst. The cave consists of impressive halls with colossal dripstone formations, as well as hydrous corridors that are also decorated with sinter- and flowstone figures. It was back in 1830 that first visitors came across the remains of a massive amount of cave bears that found a well protected place to hibernate about 40.000 years ago in the corridors near to the entrance, about 60 meters above the recent stream level. The large fossil assemblage consisting mainly of teeth and bones, as well the good reachability attracted scientists from Vienna in 1878, to excavate the fossils out of the unconsolidated clay. Later the large amount of skulls, jaws and bones, has been brought to Vienna and were stored in the Museum of Natural History. The results have been published by the head of the excavation, Ferdinand von Hochstetter in 1881 in Denkschriften der kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften in Vienna. Also from the Zoological point of view, Križna jama is one of the most interesting caves in the world. Since 1850 the cave has been intensively researched by zoologists because of its troglobionts, organisms that live exclusively in caves. Križna jama is the type locality for eight aquatic and three terrestrial taxa: Belgrandiella crucis, Belgrandiella schleschi und Zospeum exiguum (Gastropoda), Rhyacodrilus omodeoi (Oligochaeta), Niphargus orcinus (Amphipoda), Manolistra racovitzai (Isopoda), Bathyscimorphus trifurcatus, Typhlotrechus bilimeki frigens und Anophthalmus heteromorphus (Coleoptera). The article written by Sket & Stoch (Recent Fauna of the Cave Križna jama, p. 45 ff.) provides us with an overview on the current state of research. Such a large hydrous cave is of course important for geological, speleogenetic and hydrogeological research. The actual state of research is presented in the article from Knez & Prelovšek (The Geological Setting, p. 15 ff.) and Prelovšek (a: Speleogenesis and Flowstone, p. 21 ff., and b: The Hydrogeological Setting, p. 27 ff.). The reason for the release of this monograph is mostly due to the sensational discoveries of the so-called additional excavations (Rabeder & Withalm: The Re-Excavations 1999, p. 7 ff.). Later we found out that most of the remains that have been stored at the Museum of Natural History in Vienna, especially skulls and jaws excavated by Hochstetter, could not be found anymore, and we started a cooperation between the Universities Ljubljana and Vienna for an excavation project. During the years 1999 and 2001 these excavations provided us not only with the samples for the sediment analysis, stratigraphy and chronology (Kralj: Sedimentary Deposits, p. 35 ff.) but also with sensational findings of cave bear skulls from a part called Kittls Bärenhöhle. After the campaign there was enough fossil material to clarify the systematic position of the cave bears. We are dealing with Ursus ingressus Rabeder et al., 2004, the cave bear with the largest growth within the cave bear group, that most likely migrated 50.000 years ago from the east to middle Europe and has been described from the Gamssulzenhöhle in the Totes Gebirge (Upper Austria) for the first time. The metrical and morphological data of the molars give a very high evolutionary level that occurs only in the faunas of the Ursus ingressus-Group (Rabeder: Metrics and Evolutionary Level, p. 65 ff.). The quite same results Pappa (The Study of Cave Bear and Evolutionary Level, p. 73 ff.), Frischauf (The Cave Bear Incisors, p. 83 ff.), and Withalm (Analysis of the Cave Bear Metapodial Bones, p. 125 ff.), appear per the analysis of deciduous teeth, incisors and the metapodials, the same Pacher (Skeletal Element Distribution, p. 93 ff.) through the studies of skulls, jaws and the postcranial elements. Due to the size distribution of the canines from Križna jama (Rabeder & Withalm: Sexual Dimorphism, p. 117 ff.), it is visible that the male individuals dominate. Ontogenetic studies prove that the majority of the assured animals in the cave, died during their hibernation period. The highest lifespan of the bears reached 28 years (Debeljak: The Age and Sex Structure, p. 105 ff.). Beside the cave bear remains that make up approximately 99% of the paleontological findings, a few other mammals have been found: Martes martes, Canis lupus and Gulo gulo (Pacher & Döppes: Additional Faunal Elements, p. 57 ff.). These findings date back to the excavations by Ferdinand von Hochstetter. The most interesting taxon is of course Gulo gulo, the wolverine. In present times, this carnivore lives only in the arctic region, and during Middle- and Late- Pleistocene it was widespread in the Southern Alps as well. And last but not least it was possible to determine the chronological position of the cave bear remains by means of several 14C-datings (Rabeder, Withalm & Wild: Stratigraphy and Chronology of, p. 131), which showed that the bears hibernated in Križna jama during the Middle-Würmian Warm Interval.