Palombara Cave Nature Reserve
The Grotta della Palombara Nature Reserve contains one of the most beautiful and significant karst caves in Eastern Sicily.
The Grotta Palombara is a fossil karst cavity, as it is no longer affected by water circulation inside. Its entrance consists of a deep chasm at the bottom which can only be reached with the use of ropes and speleological ladders. At the end of a series of narrow tunnels and after a narrow crack, you reach the great Sala dei Vasi, so called thanks to the discovery of two vases from the Castelluccian phase. From the Sala dei Vasi you enter the Sala del Guano, a vast environment where a large colony of Vespertilio major bats lives. The droppings of this colony have accumulated on the floor of the cavity and have formed a mass of guano that is home to a rich fauna.
Two branches branch off from this room called Ramo del Geode and Ramo del Laghetto.
The cave is also of paleontological interest as fossils of large vertebrates and micro-mammals have been found inside. The epigean fauna of the cave is made up of numerous species of invertebrates and vertebrates such as the Sicilian Lizard, the Western Green Lizard, the Greater Biacco, the Kestrel, the Peregrine Falcon.
The cave fauna of the Palombara cave is rich in species of particular interest such as the pseudoscorpion Roncus siculus, an endemic species also present in the Grotta Monello, the greater Vespertilio bats, the Miniottero and the Rinolofo.
The vegetation of the protected area is very varied: from the scrub in the most inaccessible and rocky stretches, to the garrigue, to steppe formations and annual formations of lawns.
