The mystery of the tiny animal that can live up to 100 years old, eating no more than 10 times

This little creature can live up to 100 years without eating too many times. What's the secret?

This strange creature with extraordinary survival abilities is the olm (scientific name: proteus anguinus ). This is a rare species of salamander that lives entirely in the water. They are nicknamed "human fish" because of their pale skin color. The olm is the only cave-dwelling vertebrate found in Europe.

According to experts, olms have both gills and lungs. This animal can grow to nearly 45 cm long and live up to 100 years. They usually eat shrimp, snails and other small animals underwater. They find their prey thanks to a special membrane in their ears. This membrane is capable of detecting the smallest vibrations in the water.

The olm is a small animal that can live up to 100 years old. (Photo: Getty Images).

Olms are amphibians that live entirely underwater. They eat, sleep, and reproduce underwater without the need for sunlight. Their dark lifestyle has resulted in their eyes not developing and they are almost blind. However, thanks to their keen sense of smell and taste, olms can easily move in the dark.

Strange animal "lazy" to move, eats once every 10 years

Olms don't need to eat very often. When food becomes scarce, their metabolism slows down. In fact, olms can survive for up to 10 years on a single meal.

Because they live in deep caves, surrounded by darkness, olms do not need to move much to escape because they have few enemies.

In fact, the olm has only one natural enemy: daylight. So leaving the cave and being exposed to outside light would burn the animal's sensitive skin.

Olms have a keen sense of smell but are very lazy to move. (Photo: Newscientist).

This animal does not usually live in large groups. Although it has a very good sense of smell, this animal is almost blind and lives in complete darkness underground and underwater.

Previously, according to a study published in the journal Zoology in January 2020, most studies on olms have been in laboratories, so there is a lack of ecological data from natural populations in their habitat. Experts say that studying this animal can help monitor human impacts on flooded cave ecosystems.

In addition, sparse breeding activity and unique habitat make olms vulnerable species and highly sensitive bioindicators of human activities that alter their habitats.

Despite being a unique species, the olm has not been thoroughly studied, especially outside the laboratory, says Dr. Gergely Balázs at Eötvös Loránd University in Budapest, Hungary.

Since 2010, the expert's research team has been pursuing a remarkable project on the olm. Accordingly, in the population in the cave of Vruljak 1 , in eastern Herzegovina (Southern Europe), the research team has periodically marked a total of about 40 olms. The researchers have recorded the distance traveled by the olms during different periods.

As a result, after more than a decade, the research team discovered that most olms tended to move less than 10 meters. Some individuals could travel more than 10 meters. However, there was one individual that was so lazy that it stayed in the same place for 2,569 days, about more than 7 years.

" They just hang around and do almost nothing ," says Dr. Gergely Balázs .

The expert added that olms are only forced to move to mate about once every 12.5 years . This is also proof of the "lazy" lifestyle of this animal.

This research gives scientists more evidence about the evolution of animals that Charles Darwin wrote about.