This animal doesn't eat or drink for seven years, yet it still has life and can live up to 100 years underwater.
Humans can only survive three days without food and water. However, recently scientists have been studying a very magical animal. According to their observations, this animal has been surviving without eating or drinking for more than seven years, but still maintaining its life functions. This record-breaking animal is called the salamander.
No other animal can achieve this feat, but scientists from the United Kingdom and Hungary discovered that salamanders living in the caves of Bosnia and Herzegovina have barely moved (less than 10 meters in total) over the past 10 years. According to a new study published in the 'Journal of Animal Science,' the salamanders they studied even maintained their existence for seven years without movement.
For eight years, divers have been researching salamanders in the natural habitat of underwater caves in Bosnia and Herzegovina. To collect data, divers would grab the salamanders with their hands and mark them before releasing them back into their original location. During the process of studying the animal's movement and space, divers noticed that this amphibian barely did anything, including movement.
This doubly blind, monocular creature can live in complete darkness underwater for a century. Besides not being hunted, they can also survive for many years without food.
In fact, salamanders can slow down their metabolism, so their bodies can survive for 10 years after eating one meal. When they decide to eat, they will use their sharp hearing to find small shrimp and snails, and they usually move once every 12.5 years when they encounter courtship.
Although salamanders are good at being idle and staying in one place for a long time, the significance of this research is not only to observe them maintaining their stillness. It also better understands humans' understanding of vulnerable underwater ecosystems and the importance of animals living in them. However, the low reproductive rate of this species also affects the main predator of this aquatic cave community, making it a highly sensitive bioindicator of human environmental activities. It's not easy to imagine an animal surviving without eating or drinking for seven years, that's why netizens say 'I want to step into the life of a salamander.'
