Every day, around 5,000 visitors trek up the 272 narrow steps to the Batu Caves to pay their respects to Lord Murugan, the god of war and victory. Located just north of Kuala Lumpur, the bustling Malaysian capital, the caves are a focal point for devout Hindus and a must-see for foreign visitors. Tucked into a corner off the well-worn tourist trail is the Dark Cave, a natural heritage site that is the habitat of a wildlife community dating back around 100 million years.
A century of human disturbance, however, has left the trapdoor spider and the cave's fauna in a potentially tenuous state. The Batu Caves are surrounded by housing, shops and tall buildings, Lee-Sim Lim, a scientific officer from the nonprofit Cave Management Group, points out. "We have a lot of visitors coming in every day," she added, "and we still do not know what their impact is."
It is perhaps best known as home to the trapdoor spider, Liphistius batuensis, said to be the world's rarest arachnid. It is considered the crème de la crème of the Dark Cave's 200-plus species offerings.
Based on its partly segmented abdomen, researchers have determined that the spider, which is probably found exclusively in the Dark Cave, evolved about 300 million years ago, making it a living fossil of sorts. Since the species' discovery in 1878 by Western explorers, the Batu Caves have endured blasting for fossils, rock collecting, air pollution from nearby quarrying and the poaching of rare spiders. Graffiti left by tourists mar many of the Dark Cave's spectacular formations.
In 2010, the Malaysia Nature Society and the Cave Management Group took over conservation efforts in the Dark Cave. The organizations hope to conduct a thorough assessment of its wildlife and to measure the impact of visitors in the hope of finding a way to minimize human disturbances. So far these efforts have been financed by carefully planned ecotours of the section of the cave where the public is allowed access.
On a recent afternoon, a British family, a Spaniard and a couple of Americans trooped into the Dark Cave on one such tour. "Is everyone O.K. with insects?" said the tour guide, Joleen Yap, an education officer at the Cave Management Group. Around 150 species of invertebrates inhabit the Dark Cave, from the humble spiny millipede — which resembles a wiggling grain of rice — to the fierce six-inch long cave centipede, the Dark Cave's arthropod apex predator, she told the group.
Millions of roaches inhabit "cockroach valley," a tight cavern near the cave's entrance. Shining flashlights downward from an elevated path, the group gazed upon a black soup of bat guano punctuated with the writhing bodies of nymph roaches and other arthropods. Scuttling along the walls and occasionally across the path were two-inch-long adult cockroaches, sipping the air for pheromones and tasty treats with their waving antennae.
"It's very disturbing when they fly," Ms. Yap advised the visitors. "If you're feeling nervous, just close your eyes."
In the next cavern, the guano pit gave way to ornately formed stalactites and limestone chunks spotted with tiny cave snails. The bats' presence was still felt, however, as their chirps and whistles echoed overhead. "If the bats are disturbed, they tend to pee and poop on the guests," Ms. Yap warned.
As with most cave ecosystems, bats stitch the food web together in the Dark Cave. Three types of bats — insect-eating, nectar-eating and fruit-eating— inhabit its recesses. In the sunless environment, their guano replaces photosynthesis as the life-sustaining basis of the food chain. The cave racer, a type of specialized constrictor snake, also makes use of the bats by wrapping around stalactites and using its keen sense of smell to snatch its prey mid-flight. And when bats die from age or disease, their fallen bodies feed small mammals and insects on the cave floor.
The bats' roles extend beyond the Dark Cave. On nightly trips for food, they act as pollinators, seed-dispersers and insect controllers.
Yet the bats face threats from pesticides and from hunters who kill them for food and for use in preparing traditional Chinese medicine. "There's no evidence that bat potions work," Ms. Yap said. "But around 34 species of Malaysian bats are in danger of extinction."
No scientific bat survey has been undertaken in the Dark Cave since 1961, so the Cave Management Group has little idea how populations fared over years of tourism and quarrying. Because ticket sales from the ecotours are not sufficient to cover new equipment like nets for sampling bats, Dr. Lim depends solely upon her own humble bat detector for the time being.
So far, she and her colleagues have confirmed the existence of four species of bats. Various surveys dating back to 1899 identified 18 species over the years. "Based on dead bats we find and my bat detector, we're trying to identify whatever we can," Dr. Lim said. "We just found one yesterday and confirmed another record."
She said the Cave Management Group was eager to collaborate with students or institutions fond of bats and spiders.
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