Available online at scholarcommons.usf.edu/ijs / & www.ijs.speleo.it International Journal of Speleology

epikarst, a very superficial habitat under the surface of the karst in the infiltration zone (Bakalowizc, 2005), which is an ecotone between surface water and groundwater (Pipan, 2005); and the hypotelminorheic habitat (Meštrov, 1962; Culver & Pipan, 2009b), a persistent shallow subsurface of wet spots fed by subsurface water in a slight depression (Fig. 1). The aquatic compartment of the subterranean ecosystem extends through the deepest aquifers such as the Edwards Aquifer in Texas (USA) at 600 to 1000 meters deep, to the shallow interstitial habitats composed of water filled spaces between unconsolidated sediments (Culver & Pipan, 2009a). Among these subterranean compartments, the subterranean-adapted fauna can inhabit from the shallow habitats in the subsurface, through to the deepest known galleries at more than-2000 m and from the giant subterranean chambers to the smallest fissures (Sendra & Reboleira, 2012). In the early 70’s the discovery of the hypogenic karst, firstly studied in Europe and North Americ