Biospeleology of the Piemonte
(North-western Italy)

Systematic Photographic
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Grotta "La Custreta" (1593 Pi/TO)
(The "Narrow" Cave)

TECHNICAL CARD

Commune:

Sparone, Vasario

Valley:

Ribordone

Mons:

Punta Arbella

Map I.G.M.:

42 III NO Locana

Coordinates:

UTM 32T LR 8634 3376

Quota:

1350 m a.s.l.

Length:

about 200 m

Difference in level:

about +30 m

Lithotype:

Saccharoid limestone

Topography

Before 1993, it was a cave cited in the speleological cadastre and visited a pair of time in the last thirty years. Its position was in fact indicated incorrectly on the map and the indications about the location were very hazy. The author spent some days in the winter 1992 searching the entrance of this phreatic cave that opens in one of the marble lens that are distributed on the territory of the Locana Valley (Valley of the Orco river). On december 23th 1992 the author found the entrance and during a subsequent visit, in August 1993 he was able to capture 8 specimens (photographing one of them) of a Leptodirinae that has been identified by Pier Mauro Giachino (Turin Regional Natural Science Museum) as a new species and afterwards as a new genus for the Science.

We have so had an important confirmation of the fact that the Punta d'Arbella and the surrounding summits have been important refuge massifs during the latter glaciations.

During several following visits the author captured a lot of specimens of this new Cholevidae Leptodirinae insect that has been called Canavesiella lanai and he carried out search about the population of this cave, that as said by the piemontese name it's narrow in most of its extension.

It is a cold cave: the temperature of the inner ground, measured in May, was about 5 °C degrees; as a testimony of this fact, near the entrance it's often possible find tufts of Leontopodium alpinum, about 400 m below the quota where this species is normally found.

We can number among the more significant species: Alpioniscus cfr. feneriensis, an Araneae Linyphiidae, 2 new species of Ischyropsalis actually in study, Chilopoda Lithobiidae and Geophilomorpha, Sphodropsis ghilianii ssp., Trechus sp. and Oxychilus sp..

Recently, the author returned to the "Custreta" Cave together to some speleologists belonging to the Biellese Speleological Group, and under the guide or the topographer Renato Sella, we have executed the complete topography of the cave.

In the same period of the first finding of Canavesiella, the author carried out search also in a little valley near to that of Sparone, where the "Custreta" is situated, and found a similar fauna also in the cave "Boo’ d’la Faia" (1596 Pi/TO), above the sanctuary of Prascondù, at about 1800 m above the sea level.


Grotta "Boo' d'la Faia" (1596 Pi/TO)
("Hole of the Fairy" Cave)

TECHNICAL CARD

Commune:

Ribordone, Talosio

Valley:

Ribordone

Mons:

Alpe Rocco

Map I.G.M.:

42 III NO Locana

Coordinates:

UTM 32T LR 83353589

Quota:

1780 m a.s.l.

Length:

58 m

Difference in level:

-9 m

Lithotype:

Saccharoid limestone

Topography

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