Records of the Tasmanian cave fauna known or purported to be in the South Australian Museum, 2000, Clarke, Arthur

A detailed list of Tasmanian cave invertebrate specimens supposedly held in the South Australian Museum, sorted by species and also by karst area. Records indicate that the South Australian Museum collection should contain at least 334 specimens, represented by 41 species from 9 karst areas and 23 caves in Tasmania; over 40% were not located.

Glaciation and cave sediment aggradation around the margins of the Mt Field Plateau, Tasmania., 2001, Kiernan K. , Lauritzen Se. , Duhig N.

Sulfide-bearing palaeokarst deposits at Lune River Quarry, Ida Bay, Tasmania., 2001, Osborne R. A. L. , Cooper I. B.

Sulfide-bearing palaeokarst deposits at Lune River Quarry, Ida Bay, Tasmania, 2001, Osborne R. A. L. , Cooper I. B. ,

The Lune River Quarry at ida Bay. Tasmania exposes numerous palaeokarst features developed in the Ordovician Gordon Limestone. These palaeokarst features contain carbonate and siliciclastic deposits probably representing Late Devonian to early Late Carboniferous and Late Carboniferous karstification and sedimentation. Five facies of palaeokarst deposits are recognised, namely megabreccia, graded-bedded carbonate, laminated sandstone/siltstone, diamictite/quartz-lithic sandstone and coarse crystalline calcite. Pyrite, dolomite and sphalerite were emplaced in the palaeokarst deposits after the Carboniferous. These deposits are probably associated with a phase of hydrothermal cave development in Exit Cave, which adjoins the quarry. Pyrite weathering accounts for the abundance of gypsum speleothems and cave breakdown in Exit Cave

Dated speleothem evidence for uplift rates and terrace ages on the Tasmanian south coast., 2001, Kiernan K. , Lauritzen Se.

Systematic composition and distribution of Australian cave collembolan faunas with notes on exotic taxa, 2002, Greenslade, Penelope

Collembola (springtails) have been collected from caves in Tasmania, northwestern Western Australia, Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland more intensively in recent years than in the past. A sharp boundary in the composition of faunas of southern and northern Australia was found with the highest diversity of troglobitic forms in southeastern Australia and Tasmania. No extreme examples of troglobitic genera have yet been found in Western Australia. A single record of Cyphoderopsis was made from Christmas Island in the Indian Ocean, a common genus in caves in Sumatra. The Jenolan cave system has been most completely sampled with nearly 100 samples from fourteen caves. This system contains over twenty species of which three genera, Adelphoderia, Oncopodura and a new genus near Kenyura, are exclusively troglobitic with locally endemic species of conservation and phylogenetic interest. Compared with some Tasmanian caves, the Jenolan fauna appears to harbour more species that are likely to have been introduced.

Systematic composition and distribution of Australian cave collembolan faunas with notes on exotic taxa, 2002, Greenslade, Penelope

Collembola (springtails) have been collected from caves in Tasmania, northwestern Western Australia, Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland more intensively in recent years than in the past. A sharp boundary in the composition of faunas of southern and northern Australia was found with the highest diversity of troglobitic forms in southeastern Australia and Tasmania. No extreme examples of troglobitic genera have yet been found in Western Australia. A single record of Cyphoderopsis was made from Christmas Island in the Indian Ocean, a common genus in caves in Sumatra. The Jenolan cave system has been most completely sampled with nearly 100 samples from fourteen caves. This system contains over twenty species of which three genera, Adelphoderia, Oncopodura and a new genus near Kenyura, are exclusively troglobitic with locally endemic species of conservation and phylogenetic interest. Compared with some Tasmanian caves, the Jenolan fauna appears to harbour more species that are likely to have been introduced.

Karst drainage relations with catchment land use change, Mole Creek, Tasmania, Australia, 2008, Hunter, Deborah L, Trevor W Lewis And Joanna Ellison.

Since 2001, the previously perennial Parsons' Spring of the Mole Creek fluviokarst in northwestern Tasmania, Australia, has become intermittent in discharge. This change follows the establishment of 636 ha of eucalypt plantations since 1995 above the Spring, including where Quaternary slope deposits obscure the geological contact of the limestone with overlying rocks. In this 2008 study, water quality was compared and contrasted between Parsons' Spring and other sites in the study catchment and a resurgence in a nearby reference catchment over different flow conditions and in response to a rainstorm. Results show that the study spring has a mixed recharge regime and complex discharge controls, including diffuse and conduit hydrological components. Parsons' Spring is probably the main wet season overflow spring of a distributary system connected to the phreatic aquifer underlying the area. Apparent chemical 'signatures' indicating soil disturbance in the study spring's waters implied the presence of an epikarst reservoir beneath the slope deposits cultivated for plantation establishment. Given their location, extent and growth stage, the plantations are expected to reduce aquifer recharge substantially by 2013-2018 as interception of recharge increases. The consequent reduction of available aquifer yield would result in economic stress for the rural community and compromise of karst ecosystems. (This paper was first presented audio-visually at a conference of the Australian Speleological Federation in January 2009, and a shorter version has been submitted for the conference proceedings).

Rethinking eastern Australian caves, 2010, Osborne, R. A. L.

There are some 300 bodies of cavernous limestone in eastern Australia, extending from Precipitous Bluff in southeastern Tasmania to the Mitchell Palmer region in north Queensland. These impounded karsts, developed in Palaeozoic limestones of the Tasman Fold Belt System, contain many caves. The caves have a suite of features in common that allows them to be thought of as a major group: the Tasmanic Caves. The Tasmanic Caves include multiphase hypogene caves such as Cathedral Cave at Wellington and multiphase, multiprocess caves such as Jenolan with Carboniferous hypogene and younger paragenetic and fluvial elements. Active hypogene caves occur at Wee Jasper and possibly at five other localities. The Tasmanic Caves are one of the most complex suites of caves in folded Palaeozoic limestones in the world. Field techniques developed to study these caves are now being applied to complex caves in central Europe: in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia.

Ferruginous thermal spring complexes, northwest Tasmania: Evidence that far-field stresses acting on a fracture mesh can open and maintain vertical flow in carbonate terrains, 2011, Davidson G. J. , Bavea M. , Harris K.

Far-field stress changes in the southern Australian plate since 5 Ma have produced significant areas of uplift and seismicity. In northwest Tasmania, there is evidence that this stress reorientation to maximum horizontal NW-SE stress has influenced meteoric-derived thermal (15-20°C) discharge patterns of confined karstic aquifers, by placing pre-existing NW-trending faults/fractures into a dilated state or a critically stressed state. Previous studies have shown that spring discharge has operated continuously for at least 65,000 years, and has transported large volumes of solutes to the surface to be deposited as mounds of calcite-goethite-silica up to 7 m high. The thermal spring chemistry at one site, Mella, is consistent with descent to at least 1.2-1. 5 km, although the hinterland within 50 km is less than 500 m elevation. Thermal spring chemistry is consistent with most of the deep water-rock interaction occurring in low-strontium Smithton Dolomite. While some of this water is discharged at springs, some instead intersects shallow zones of NE-fracture-controlled rock (2 ? 4 km in area) with karstic permeability where, although confined and subject to a NE-directed hydraulic gradient, it circulates and cools to ambient temperature, with only minor mixing with other groundwaters

Ferruginous thermal spring complexes, northwest Tasmania: evidence that far-field stresses acting on a fracture mesh can open and maintain vertical flow in carbonate terrains, 2011, Davidson Garry J. , Bavea Michael, Harris Kathryn

Far-field stress changes in the southern Australian plate since 5 Ma have produced significant areas of uplift and seismicity. In northwest Tasmania, there is evidence that this stress reorientation to maximum horizontal NW–SE stress has influenced meteoricderived thermal (15–20°C) discharge patterns of confined karstic aquifers, by placing pre-existing NWtrending faults/fractures into a dilated state or a critically stressed state. Previous studies have shown that spring discharge has operated continuously for at least 65,000 years, and has transported large volumes of solutes to the surface to be deposited as mounds of calcite-goethite-silica up to 7 m high. The thermal spring chemistry at one site, Mella, is consistent with descent to at least 1.2–1.5 km, although the hinterland within 50 km is less than 500 m elevation. Thermal spring chemistry is consistent with most of the deep water–rock interaction occurring in low-strontium Smithton Dolomite. While some of this water is discharged at springs, some instead intersects shallow zones of NE-fracture-controlled rock (2×4 km in area) with karstic permeability where, although confined and subject to a NE-directed hydraulic gradient, it circulates and cools to ambient temperature, with only minor mixing with other groundwaters. 

Tasmanian Trechinae and Psydrinae (Coleoptera, Carabidae): a taxonomic and biogeographic synthesis, with description of new species and evaluation of the impact of Quaternary climate changes on evolution of the subterranean fauna(3), 2011, Stefan Eberhard, Pier Mauro Giachino

This paper provides taxonomic, distributional and ecological data for 59 species in 17 genera of Trechinae and Psydrinae from Tasmania, and describes 18 new species in six existing genera (Pterocyrtus, Tasmanorites, Sloanella, Trechistus, Goedetrechus, Tasmanotrechus) collected from caves, forest and montane habitats: Pterocyrtus grayi sp. nov., P. meridionalis sp. nov., Tasmanorites beatricis sp. nov., T. daccordii sp. nov.,T. lynceorum sp. nov., T. microphthalmus sp. nov., Sloanella gordoni sp. nov., Trechistus gordoni sp. nov., Goedetrechus minutus sp. nov., G. rolanisp. nov., G. florentinus sp. nov., G. damperi sp. nov., Tasmanotrechus gordoni sp. nov., T. alticola sp. nov., T. montisfieldi sp. nov., T. osbornianussp. nov., T. moorei sp. nov., T. rolani sp. nov. Forty-one (41) previously described species have been re-examined and illustrated with supplementary descriptions. New collection records combined with the published literature revealed 196 records of 83 species in 21 genera, collected from 41 localities (including 11 karst areas). Regional-scale survey coverage has been patchy and three biogeographic regions stand out as poorly surveyed: Flinders, South East, and Northern Midlands. Local-scale survey efforts have been intensive at just a few localities, the richest being 18 species recorded at Cradle Mountain. Seventeen (17) described species of Zolini and Trechini are troglobites with distribution ranges restricted to individual karst areas. Some karst areas and caves harbour multiple congeneric species which differ in their degree of troglomorphic specialization suggesting heterochronic colonisations, possibly linked to multiple Quaternary glacial / inter-glacial cycles. Palaeo-climatic and palaeo-vegetation evidence is examined to test the ‘Climatic Relict Hypothesis’ as a mechanism driving evolution of the subterranean fauna. It is proposed that present-day troglobitic Trechinae in Tasmania are derived from troglophilic progenitors that colonised subterranean habitats from adjacent forest ground litter habitats during Pleistocene inter-glacial periods, while retreat of forests during glacial periods isolated subterranean populations from surface populations facilitating troglogenesis. It is predicted that future collecting efforts will reveal many additional new subteranean species, including in non-karstic Shallow Subterranean Habitats (SSH).

Three new hyporheic water mite species from Australia (Acari: Hydrachnidia), 2013, Harry Smit

Three new hyporheic water mite species are described from Australia, viz.Wandesia minuta, Partidomomonia elongata and Mellamunda tasmanica. With the description of these three species, some 50 hyporheic water mites species are known from Australia. In this paper the firstPartidomomonia species for Tasmania is described, the third Wandesiaspecies for Australia as well as the second species of the genusMellamunda.