Dingo Donga Cave, Madura Roadhouse, Dundas Shire, Western Australia, Australiai

Regional Level Types
Dingo Donga Cave	Cave
Madura Roadhouse	Community
Dundas Shire	Shire
Western Australia	State
Australia	Country

A "donga" is the name for a sinkhole or cave on the otherwise flat, featureless Nullarbor Plain. It goes by the alternative name of Cave of Bats. The cave is not far from Cocklebiddy (a small roadhouse community located on the Eyre Highway in Western Australia).

Discovered in the 1930s by naturalist Charles Barrett, but subsequent expeditions failed to locate the cave again until 1967. Located on the vast flat treeless Nullarbor Plain, a huge piece of limestone stretching across the top of the Great Australian Bight, and straddling the border between Western and South Australia.

Despite being one of the few sources of water in the region, its caves were generally avoided by aboriginal tribes, fearing evil spirits. Today a highway and railway line cross the region, but it is devoid of any towns.

It is the type locality for uricite. This species had been omitted from mineral name lists, and the oversight was corrected by the IMA in 1973.

Uricite occurs with minor bisphosphammite, brushite, syngenite, and several unidentified compounds in bird guano at the site. The deposit covers several square meters in two patches on high outcrops of limestone, under the overhang of the cave entrance collapse. The Guano forms large layered domes, probably as a roosting site for kestrels or owls.

Other Regions, Features and Areas containing this locality

References