In the period from August 10 to September 1, 2010, 9 th speleologists from 6 bulgarian caving clubs members of Bulgarian Federation of Speleology, together with 5 th Kyrgyz cavers carried out joint speleological expedition in the area of Ridge Kokshaaltau – Mountain Tien Shan in South Kyrgyzstan (Kyrgizia). For the first time in the history of Speleology in Bulgaria, Bulgarian cavers searched and explore new caves as high altitude. The study was concentrated in the area adjacent to the Chinese border. During the expedition three base camp was build at – 3050, 3200 and 3600 m a.s.l.The maximum altitude which the cavers have reached is 4280 m, i.e. the lower limit of the permanent frozen zone.For the 11 days of field work there were studied approximately 90 square miles of open area. On this territory 35 karst objects was found including- cave niches, caves and pot holes.Unfortunately, because of the geological hydrogeological and climatic conditions in the area the surface and underground karst are not well developed so the longest explored cave was only 250 m and the deepest one was – 50 m. The highest cave was situated at 4012 m.a.s.l. The expedition team consists of specialists in various fields of scientific knowledge – geology, biology, geodesy, geographic information systems and others.This allowed all sites to be mapped and to prepare a complete documentation on them. An important part of the program was devoted to geological studies and surveying as geomorphological assessment of potential of the karst area. Biospeleogical and zoological studies was made also. As a result a big quantity of zoological material was collected, assuming that a large portion of the species are endemic species hither to unknown to science. Unfortunately, the conditions living in the caves are raw, cold and dry cave fauna is poor but some species of Araneae and Opiliones were found. Zh. Vlaikov found an interesting unknown type Crustacea. Significantly greater interest are found on the surface of invertebrate 3-4 species new to science wingless bugs, suspected new species to science four snails, millipedes, beetles and spiders around 15 species in isolated habitats. Successful results are due to the excellent logistical support of our Kirgizian colleagues from “Asia Mountains” Group under the direction of the veteran of Kirgizian speleology Sergei Dudashvili.During the collaboration established close friendly relations between the two teams.Both sides have expressed mutual interest for the implementation of new joint initiatives in the field of speleology and multidisciplinary research on karst terrains.
Members of the expedition from the Bulgarian side:
Kamen Bonev ,Caving Club “Vertilend”, Sofia, Expedition leader
Vanioya Gyorev, Caving Club “Caving”, Sofia,
Georges Vlaikov, Caving Club “Caving”, Sofia,
Kiril Danailov Caving Club “Helictit Sofia”,
Konstantin Stoilov, student Caving Club “Academic”, Sofia,
Nicholas Sveshtarov, Caving Club “Helictit”, Sofia,
Nicholas Simov, Caving Club “Helictit “, Sofia
Plamen Spilkov, Caving Club “Aida”, Haskovo
Todor Todorov, Caving Club “Mrak” Etropole,
Reported by Alexey Zhalov