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Carlsbad Caverns National Park

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Carlsbad Caverns National Park Carlsbad Caverns National Park CANYONS & CAVES A Newsletter from the Resources Stewardship & Science Division _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________ Issue No. 32 Spring 2004 Elizabeth and Dr. Willis T. Lee in the King’s Palace during the 1924 National Geographic Expedition to Carlsbad Cavern. See Bob Hoff’s article on Elizabeth Lee starting on page 3. (NPS Photo from the Dana Lee Collection) Edited by Dale L. Pate Proofreading: Paula Bauer RESOURCE NEWS TABLE OF CONTENTS THANKS AND GOODBYE – Congratulations to Resource News 1 Superintendent Mary Gibson Scott. She has been selected to Elizabeth Lee – Early Woman Explorer 3 be the new Superintendent at Grand Teton National Park Troll Town Bridge Project 5 beginning in early May. We have appreciated the Search and Rescue Training 2004 6 Superintendent’s ability to make a number of critical projects IMB Day Honors Cave Swallows 7 take major steps forward while still protecting park resources. Save Our Cave Day 2004 9 We will miss her energy and drive and know that Grand Teton 2003 Lechuguilla Cave Summary 10 National Park will be in good hands. Look for Issues of Canyons & Caves at the following websites: NEW DEPTH FOR LECHUGUILLA CAVE – A more http://www.nps.gov/cave/pub-pdf.htm Thanks to Kelly Thomas and Bridget reliable depth for Lechuguilla Cave has been determined to be Eisfeldt all issues can be downloaded as a PDF file from the park website. 1,604 feet (489.0 meters). No new deeper passage has been http://www.caver.net/ Once there, go to the Canyons & Caves icon. Bill Bentley has placed all issues on his personal website and can also be found, but several significant survey loop closure errors have downloaded as PDF files. been fixed over the last few years. By fixing these errors, we Address: 3225 National Parks Highway, Carlsbad, New Mexico 88220 have a better idea of the actual depth of the known cave. As 1 Canyons & Caves No. 32 - Spring 2004 the survey data becomes more reliable, particularly in relationship to the depth of the cave, we may have to adjust our depth figures once again. For now, the known depth of the cave is 1,604 feet (489 meters) deep. UPCOMING CONSTRUCTION PROJECTS – To help serve visitors to the park and to better protect resources, there are several significant changes scheduled for the park in the next few years. The first will be the Visitor Center Rehabilitation Project that will completely rehab the current Visitor Center (a Mission 66 building from the late 1950s). This rehab will not change the overall footprint other than place new restrooms outside the front of the building and the kennel is to be moved to the west side of the building. This project is slated to cost $7.2 million with construction to begin within a year or so. Closely following this project will be the repair and rehab of Walnut Canyon Drive and the three parking lots Civil Defense water barrels were removed from Left-Hand Tunnel. associated with the Visitor Center for $2.45 million. This 7- mile long paved road was first built in 1930 and several BIOLOGY BRANCH NEWS – The two-year Barbary sheep problems will be fixed during this project. Additionally, monitoring project got up and running in early March. The problems associated with the parking lots will be fixed along enthusiastic biotech crew, which will be here until mid-May or with the addition of oil and gas separators being installed. mid-June, depending on the budget, consists of Anthony Also under this project, the bat flight parking area will be Novack and Kristin Dorman-Johnson, with Gary Lenhart reconfigured with a bus drop-off and handicapped parking put as a volunteer for four weeks. They are being supervised by in place on the west end and with pavement from much of the Kelly Fuhrmann. Lots of background information and current parking area to be removed. As part of the Caverns equipment was put together over the winter by Donna Laing Historic District, the rock walls will be left in place for most and Fuhrmann. This is the long-awaited start of a project first of this area. The third project, the replacement and planned in 2000. Many thanks to everyone who has helped get realigning of the outfall sewer line will be completed after this show on the road, including: volunteer Laing for helping the others at a cost of $2.57 million. Scheduled for plan equipment and logistics and gathering research literature; replacement will be the line from the Bat Flight restrooms to to NMSU (Las Cruces) librarian Susan Beck for sending us so the front of the Visitor Center, the outfall system from the much literature on Barbary sheep; our protection rangers for Visitor Center down to the present sewage lagoons, and the long backcountry safety briefings; and to VIP Lenhart for rehab of the present sewage lagoons. contributing his expertise. Welcome! Anita Swanson is scheduled to return April 4 for a second season of bird nesting monitoring at Rattlesnake Springs. Welcome, Anita! David Roemer has received a special recognition award from Intermountain Region for his work in GIS (geographical information system). He received a certificate and an award. Many of us know what a valuable service he performs for all divisions in the park with GIS. It’s nice to see him being recognized for his achievements. Kelly Fuhrmann has designed a great new pocket- In preparation for replacing the sewer lines, Keith Pruitt, Bill Willis, Ken sized notebook called Resource Observations. It contains Frank, Bernie Rodriquez, Robert Smith, and Jimmy Sillas discuss sewer line handy little pages for staff to use to report biological and other alignment for sewage being pumped from the Bat Flight restrooms up to the resource observations while out in the park. Call Kelly at front of the Visitor Center. (NPS Photo by Dale L. Pate) extension 3100 if you would like to get one. CIVIL DEFENSE BARRELS REMOVED – At the height of Renée West attended the fourth Southwestern Rare the Cold War, the Underground Concessions area of Carlsbad and Endangered Plant Conference March 22-25 at New Cavern was declared a Fall Out Shelter. In early 1963, food, Mexico State University. Many of the botanists who have water, and medical supplies were received and stored in an something to do with the history or the future of our park’s area off of Pickle Alley. While most of the items were federally listed cacti were scheduled to be there, including: removed from the cave a number of years ago, seven steel Ken Heil, who co-wrote the recovery plan; Marc Baker, who water barrels had been left in an alcove off of Left-hand studied the characteristics of the cacti recently; Phil Tonne and Tunnel only a short distance from the paved concessions area. Tim Meehan from New Mexico Natural Heritage Program, For long-term protection of the barrels as well as for resource who have done several years of rare plant surveys in the park; protection (the barrels had been rusting), the barrels were Charlie McDonald, formerly with U.S. Fish and Wildlife removed from the cave and temporarily stored at the Cultural Service, who worked with the park in the 1990s on Resources office. consultation; Nancy Baczek, currently working with the park 2 Canyons & Caves No. 32 - Spring 2004 on its EIS and biological assessment for fire management; ELIZABETH LEE Patricia Barlow-Irick, a botanist who has helped with rare EARLY WOMAN EXPLORER plant surveys in the park; and Bruce Rittenhouse, an endangered plants specialist with the NPS Biological by Bob Hoff Resources Management Division, who is working with us on a technical assistance request to organize monitoring data. All photos are NPS photos from the Dana Lee Collection taken during the 1924 National Geographic Expedition. ONE MORE CAVE – A new cave was recently documented bringing the total known in the park to 107. Walter Fiester with a full wheel barrel of rubble. (NPS Photo by Dale Pate) Elizabeth Lee – one of the first women explorer’s of Carlsbad Cavern. PBSS RUBBLE HAUL – Saturday, March 13 saw a small If any person’s name is synonymous with Carlsbad Caverns crew from the Permian Basin Speleological Society out of the National Park, that person would be James Larkin White, the Midland-Odessa area continuing their long-standing tradition 16-yr. old cowboy turned cavern explorer around 1898. He of helping the park remove rubble from the Old Underground explored the cavern, built trails, and guided others along them, Lunchroom. Walter Fiester, Tom Kaler, Rebecca Lee, and becoming the foremost advocate of the cavern known as Bat Ruel Metcalf spent all day removing an entire dump truck load Cave then, and Carlsbad Cavern now. of rubble. Thanks to Tom Bemis for overseeing their work (and hauling buckets of rubble) and Jimmy Sillas and other Appointed in 1925 as the first National Park Service Chief maintenance folks for providing the wheel barrels and the park Guide at the caverns, his four year formal tenure with the dump truck. federal government was, by bureaucratic time spans, swift, but his association with the caverns was long-lasting and continues today. His story is pivotal for understanding the early history of the caverns. But the young Jim White was not the only young person to be bitten by the cave exploration “bug” at an early age. While Jim White’s association with the caverns was decades long, for 22-yr.old Elizabeth Louise Lee the association was, by comparison, brief. Elizabeth Lee served on the 1924 six- month (day-trips only) National Geographic Society- sponsored caverns expedition led by her father, the noted geologist Willis T.
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