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Inside Earth National Park Service Cave and Karst Programs U.S. Department of the Interior Inside Earth Lily pad speleothems in the Hall of the Flying Monkeys, one of the recent discoveries in the Oz area of Lechuguilla Cave, Carlsbad Caverns National Park. NPS Photo by James Hunter. Contents A Word from WASO Program Overview ..................................................................................................................................................................... 2 Preliminary NPS Cave and Karst Summaries ............................................................................................................................... 4 Reports from the Field Return to Oz ............................................................................................................................................................................. 6 Carbidimites in Wind Cave ........................................................................................................................................................ 8 Park Updates BUFF, CAVE .............................................................................................................................................................................. 9 CORO ..................................................................................................................................................................................... 11 GRCA, GRBA .......................................................................................................................................................................... 12 JECA ....................................................................................................................................................................................... 13 LABE ....................................................................................................................................................................................... 14 OZAR ...................................................................................................................................................................................... 15 TICA ........................................................................................................................................................................................ 16 WICA ...................................................................................................................................................................................... 17 Newsletter of the Cave and Karst Programs • Volume 16 Number 2 Calendar A Word from WASO Submitted By Dale Pate March 2014 Significant progress has been made on 15-22nd 16th International Symposium several fronts since the Spring 2013 In- on Vulcanospeleology, Puerto Ayora, side Earth was published. Travel for Galápagos Islands, Ecuador, http:// www.vulcanospeleology.org/ Technical Assistance Requests from symposia.html NPS park units and a National Natural Landmark kept me busy beginning in June 2014 April. I have summarized these requests 5-15th Karst Without Boundaries hydrol- below. Additionally, summaries for 30 ogy conference and field seminar, cave and karst park units were complet- Croatia http://diktas.iwlearn.org/ ed by Limaris Soto during this time as July 2014 well. To learn more about this project, 14-18th National Speleological Society please review her article in this issue of (NSS) Convention at the new NSS Inside Earth. As we learn more about Headquarters, Huntsville, Alabama cave and karst resources found within http://nss2014.caves.org/ NPS units, we hope to identify critical October 2014 needs, develop project proposals with Dale Pate, NPS National Cave and Karst Pro- gram Coordinator 19-22nd Geological Society of America park input, and seek funding to better Annual Meeting, Vancouver, British understand and protect our sensitive created placed large rocks, boulders, and Columbia, Canada cave and karst resources. other debris over and into many of the www.geosociety.org/meetings/2014/ openings to prevent livestock from falling March/April 2015 Grand Canyon-Parashant Na- into the earth cracks. Written recom- 29-2nd George Wright Society Confer- tional Monument mendations for monument actions con- ence, Oakland, California http:// cerning the return to more natural condi- www.georgewright.org/ Created in 2000, this new monument is tions for these features will be forwarded rugged and remote. Administratively, in the near future. July 2015 13-17th NSS Convention, Waynesville, the monument is operated by both the Missouri https://www.facebook.com/ National Park Service and Bureau of Golden Gate National Recrea- NSSConvention2015 Land Management. I was invited to ac- tional Area company a trip to a monument cave led November 2015 by Eathan McIntyre and several re- Famous for Alcatraz and spectacular 1-4th Geological Society of America An- search paleontologists to recon several views of the Golden Gate Bridge and San nual Meeting , Baltimore, Maryland http://www.geosociety.org/ sites within the cave. Recommendations Francisco, Golden Gate NRA also con- meetings/2015/ included completing a Cave and Karst tains numerous sea caves. I was invited to Management Plan and some minor visit to get a sense of the cave resources, July 2016 changes to protocols when entering the overall natural setting, and the very 17-23rd NSS 75th Anniversary Conven- monument caves. complex management issues. I also was tion in Ely, Nevadahttps:// www.facebook.com/nss75th asked to provide guidance on infor- Wupatki National Monument mation needs and to be a liaison with local cavers that already know and have Known for its pre-historic structures information on cave areas within Golden Submit Entries for the Calendar to and ties to native cultures, Wupatki NM Gate NRA. My visit generated considera- [email protected] also contains significant earth cracks ble interest from local cavers, staff at and sinks. These features are found in Golden Gate NRA, and from resource the 250 million year old Permian Kaibab staff at nearby Point Reyes National Sea- limestone which outcrops over a large shore. portion of the monument. Air move- ment in and around these features di- rectly connect to stories found in the Hopi Culture concerning the source of Mitchell Caverns Natural Pre- all winds and the Wind God, Yaponcha. serve (National Natural Land- Past practices before the monument was mark) 2 Inside Earth • Vol. 16 No. 2 • Fall 2013 closure had been routinely picking up debris as it fell onto the floors. In the Upcoming Year Looking forward, my plan is to begin a more intensive look at park units with karst-related needs. In particular, I would like to look at, but not limited to: • recharge basins and flow paths • potential contaminant sources • endemic ecosystem species and dynam- ics Many times, NPS park units do not con- tain the entire karst system. Park manag- ers not only need to know the resources within their boundaries but what factors and resources outside the park unit boundaries may affect the resources they Two lower entrances to Mitchell Caverns. The tour route goes through the opening on the manage. I welcome ideas and thoughts right. NPS Photo by Dale Pate. on potential projects that we should con- sider. If so inclined, please email me at Part of the California State Parks system assessing the areas for potential rockfall [email protected]. located within Providence Mountains problems before reopening the cave to State Recreation Area (PMSRA), Mitch- the public. The entrance area showed ell Caverns was closed in the spring of that various animals had been active 2011 due to state budgets cuts. Located over the last two years and knocked within Mojave National Preserve, the small rocks and other debris onto the preserve and cave are fairly remote and trail. The blasted portion within the initially had no one living on the premis- cave showed that the tunneling had ac- es. This led to surface buildings being tually cut through an area of clay inter- heavily vandalized along with the remov- bedded with thin layers of flowstone. al of thousands of feet of electrical cable The blasting had shattered much of the in February 2012. The cave itself lost exposed clay and flowstone. It appears some electrical cable but did not appear the tunnel was blasted through an exist- to have been vandalized beyond the theft ing tunnel that had been naturally filled of cable. After the vandalism, the State of with the interbedded clay and flow- California hired a caretaker and began stone. With a solid limestone roof and a the repair of facilities with the goal of well-made concrete floor, only pieces of reopening PMSRA and Mitchell Caverns. dried cracked pieces of clay and flow- With the cave being closed for more than stone were tumbling out of the filled two years, the entrance area and a 15-foot passage onto the trail. There was no blasted tunnel in the middle of the cave evidence to indicate a problem from had debris that had fallen onto the trail. collapse, but rather the debris found on Through the NPS Pacific West Region the floor had slowly built up over two National Natural Landmark Program years as pieces of dried clay or broken Coordinator, the facility manager for flowstone fell out of the walls. Evident- Mitchell Caverns requested assistance in ly, the guides and caretakers before the Inside Earth • Vol. 16 No. 2 • Fall 2013 3 A Word from WASO Preliminary NPS Cave and Karst Summaries the Parks reports is the identification
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