Spelaeogriphacea

Taxobox
name = Spelaeogriphacea


image_width = 250px
image_caption =
regnum = Animalia
phylum = Arthropoda
subphylum = Crustacea
classis = Malacostraca
ordo = Spelaeogriphacea
ordo_authority = Gordon, 1957
familia = Spelaeogriphidae
familia_authority = Gordon, 1957
subdivision_ranks = Genera
subdivision = "Mangkurtu" "Potiicoara" "Spelaeogriphus"

Spelaeogriphacea is an order of crustaceans that grow to no more than 10 mm. Only four species, all subterranean, have been described. Of the three genera, "Potiicoara" is known only from a cave in Brazil's Matto Grosso, "Spelaeogriphus" only from a cave on Table Mountain in South Africa, and the two "Mangkurtu" species only from individual Australian aquifers. This widely separated distribution implies an early origin for the group, hypothesised as emerging at least 200 million years before present in the Tethys Sea around Gondwana. Little is known about the ecology of the order.