A species of pale, blind, aquatic salamanders call olms, nicknamed “dragons” due to their long, slender bodies, are hating inside Postojna Cave in southwestern Slovenia. Olms lay their eggs only once or twice a decade, even though they live as much as 100 years.
Earlier this year researchers found 50 to 60 eggs in the cave. Only 22 viable eggs are left, but the first has just hatch. Biologists around the world are dancing with excitement, because very few olm eggs typically hatch, normally only about two out of 500 eggs because of decay spreading through the nest and predators.
The team is keeping a close eye on the eggs to see which one will be the next baby dragon. The first hatchling shot out of the egg and swam around the aquarium, finally coming to rest at the bottom. The hatchings happen quickly making it difficult to catch the birth on film.
The team said, “Our first baby dragon managed to shoot into life in a single attempt. This is one of the reasons why the infrared camera footage is invaluable both for biologists and the general public; in fact, olm hatching has never been filmed before.
Another reason for worldwide scientific excitement is that the Postojna eggs are the only ones people can actually visit. No one has ever found them in the wild outside the Slovenia cave.
Olms grow to about 13.5 inches long and have four small limbs. They look like pink worms with tiny arms. They have no eyesight, searching for foot through smell and feel. They can go for up to a decade with no food. The baby that just hatched will reach maturity in about 15 years.
The nickname “dragon” came from Slovenian researcher Janez Vajkard Valvasor in 1689. He first described them as baby dragons in a book titled The Glory of the Duchy of Carniola. He said the baby dragons would eventually be washed into the sea where they would mature and spend their lives under the earth’s crus. The notion was not dispelled until the 1800s when researchers discovered the olms were actually amphibians.
photo credit Grotte Hohle