Researchers Find New Gecko Species to Flying Snakes in Cambodia Limestone Caves

Cambodian limestone caves, most of which have yet to be explored, stretch thousands of miles, are home to countless undiscovered species and have unique ecosystems, with creatures not found anywhere else on Earth.

A new survey of caves in the northwestern Battambang province has revealed a variety of species new to science, including a venomous python snake, a flying snake, several geckos, two micro snails, and two thousand feet.

The venomous snake and three new gecko species are still in the process of official naming and characterization.

Other findings have been officially acknowledged during a biodiversity survey, which explored 64 caves on 10 hills between November 2023 and July 2025, and was published in a report on April 24.

Every hill and cave in Cambodia's rocky karst landscape - a term for a landscape formed when rocks collapse, forming large cave springs, disappearing streams and collapsed holes - is isolated from each other.

Each serves as a "laboratory island" of its own evolution, housing different life forms that have adapted to their particular habitats, according to the UK-based conservation charity Fauna & Flora, which led the survey with the Cambodian Ministry of Environment and field experts.

"Think of it as a snapshot of their own biodiversity, where nature is doing the same experiment over and over again independently," said evolutionary biologist Lee Grismer, a biology professor at La Sierra University in California, who supported the survey team, in a statement. , reported by CNN (1/6).

"We go to these separate places and analyze the DNA of the species, and we see how the experiment goes. Some look similar, some look different, and by analyzing this we can get an idea of what the driving force behind the way they evolved," he added.

For example, when researchers identified a single-toed Kamping Poi-striped gecko species, Cyrtodactylus kampingpoiensis, during fieldwork in 2024, they found four distinct populations that evolved in different ways.

"If we really want to preserve biodiversity on this planet, we need to understand what's out there," Grismer said.

"We can't protect something if we don't know where it is," he said.

Globally threatened species such as the Sunda pangolin, green peafowl, long-tailed macaque, and northern pig-tailed macaque were also found in the landscape during the latest survey.

Conservation biologist Pablo Sinovas heads Fauna & Flora in Cambodia, working with local researchers to get an idea of the terrain during the day and - the "fun" part - search for creatures such as snakes and geckos at night, "when they are most active, when they come out of hiding," he told CNN.

The team will depart after sunset and spend hours exploring the "sharp rocky field" with torches, "looking into every crevice, looking around the caves in the landscape, rocks, branches, vegetation, really everywhere. It's kind of a fun search team," said Sinovas, who is now a senior program manager at the charity.

Several caves in the region house up to one million bats, although the research team did not enter caves with large bat colonies due to health concerns, according to the report.

The karst landscape covers about 9 percent of Cambodia's land area, namely 20,000 square kilometers (or 7,722 square miles), according to the report, which outlines "most of this area is still unknown to science."

Fourteen caves that had not been surveyed were registered on a karst hill in Banan district, Battambang province.

"There is still a lot of exploration to be done," said Sinovas, adding that they had only "scratched the surface" in terms of the biodiversity waiting to be discovered in Cambodia's wider landscape ecosystems.

In addition to being home to various species, many caves are used as sacred places, or for meditation and other rituals, and are visited by tourists and pilgrims, according to the report.

Nevertheless, karst habitats are threatened by poorly planned cement mining, as well as excessive tourism, wildlife hunting, deforestation, and forest fires.

"Demand for cement continues to increase, and karst limestone is very useful for making cement, therefore, karst provides very important raw materials," said Sinovas.

"However, obviously, if you destroy an area where a particular species lives, and that species does not live anywhere else, then you automatically potentially cause the extinction of the species - in some cases, species that have not even been described," he continued.

"So, we are working with the government to ensure that these important areas are better protected," said Sinovas, adding that there are ongoing discussions on "giving these areas a certain protected status, so that they can be preserved in the future."