Central Texas is an internationally-recognized hotspot of biodiversity due largely to cave habitat developed within the Balcones Escarpment. Referred to by Charles Darwin as “wrecks of ancient life”, most cave-adapted species are considered to be relicts persisting in subsurface refugia long after their surface ancestors abandoned their geographic range due to climatic fluctuations. In some cases the ancestors are now extinct. This special diversity includes sixteen species of troglobitic beetles and arachnids that have been listed as endangered under the Federal Endangered Species Act. These species occur nowhere else on the planet and the karst outcrop in which their habitat occurs is threatened by the rapidly expanding communities of the IH-35 corridor. Cambrian staff are among a handful of private consultants who are fully permitted to conduct karst invertebrate due-diligence studies.
