Sinkholes often hold mysteries that only a few dare to venture into. As such, a Chinese sinkhole was recently discovered to be hiding an ancient forest around 630 feet underground.
Ancient Forest Discovered
China's Geopark brought a pleasant surprise to a team of scientists in May 2022 when they ventured further to find an underground mystery deep underground. This phenomenon was described as "heaven pits" or "tiankeng" in Chinese.
The ancient forest was discovered in a Geopark located in Southwest China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region called the Leye Fengshan UNESCO Global Geopark. About 60% of the site is covered in carbonate rocks from Devonian to Permian over 3000m thick.
This area holds the world's longest natural bridge and is well-known for being covered in caves. While sinkholes aren't uncommon in China, researchers found a primitive forest inside one that could've been where unidentified animal and plant species resided.
China is known to officially have 30 sinkholes, according to Xinhua, the country's government state-owned news agency. Zhang Yuanhai, a Karst Geology of the China Geological Survey senior engineer, told the news site the primitive forest was well-preserved.
This ancient forest had three caves in its walls with the forest located at the bottom. The sinkhole was 306m long, 150m wide, and 192m deep with volume exceeding 5 million cubic meters, making it the largest in the world.
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Exploring the Cave
Chen Lixin led a cave expedition team called Guangxi 702, and they found ancient trees reaching almost 40 meters high from the bottom. They also found dense shade plants tall enough to reach a person's shoulder.
It took the cave expedition team several hours of trekking to reach the bottom of the pit after abseiling down over 100 meters. The Geopark landscape was also made mostly of limestone, being located in a Karst land area.
Sinkholes are common around the area as they're mostly created due to bedrock dissolution because of groundwater. The forest was able to strive due to the design of the hole, allowing enough sunlight to get deep for photosynthesis to happen.
Importance of the Geosites
The UNESCO Global Geopark has been subject to extensive research, resulting in 149 papers and 100 different educational books being published about the site. To extend exploration in the area, UNESCO Global Geopark has different routes set up to ensure visitors, scientists, and explorers can venture around the site.
Great efforts have been made by UNESCO Global Geopark for economic development patterns to be positioned toward sustainability. This applies to agricultural products like rice, corn, canola, sweet potato, and canola.
George Venti, the National Cave and Karst Research Institute US executive director said the discovery wasn't a surprise. He also explained how rainwater was slightly acidic, which in turn permeates cracks in the bedrock while wearing away tunnels over time, giving birth to chambers.
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