SPECIES DIVERSITY OF FISH IN NGINGRONG CAVE GUNUNGSEWU KARST AREA, YOGYAKARTA

SPECIES DIVERSITY OF FISH
IN NGINGRONG CAVE
GUNUNGSEWU KARST AREA, YOGYAKARTA

ABSTRACT
Chomsun HK (choms_cepot@yahoo.com)1), Ratih A. 2),Trijoko 2)

Gunungsewu Karst Area has unique topography with its specific ecosystem. One of many caves which was formed by the endokarstic fenomena is Ngingrong cave. It’s a multipitch vertical cave which has downstream river system. The aim of this research was to study the fish diversity in Ngingrong cave. This research is important to be done because cavefish habitat degradations are still going on.
Research was done on October 2008 in Ngingrong cave, Regency of Gunungkidul. Electrofishing was used to collect the hypogean fishes. Specimen was then preserved by alcohol 70%. Identification of specimen using determination key by Kottelat (1993). Characters of hypogean fishes was compared with the epigean fishes from same genus.
Four species from three families were found in Ngingrong cave, they were Puntius binotatus, Puntius microps (Cyprinidae), Poecilia reticulata (Poeciliidae), and Clarias olivaceus (Clarridae). Observation on the morphology of hypogean fish characters showed that they have an adaptation to the cave environment by their regressive change of melanophore index and their contstructive change of linealateralis scale number. They have pigmentation regression and maximum number of linea lateralis scale. The conclution is these four hypogean fish species have been adapted to cave environment which have pigmentation degradation and sensory organ development.

Keywords: Karst, Fish, Cave, Character, Ngingrong