The FLOWSTONE
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The FLOWSTONE Vol Vol 20 Issue 2 February 2013 Graves 2013 A Monthly Newsletter of the Cullman Grotto of the National Speleological Society February 2013 Cullman Grotto Flowstone CULLMAN GROTTO FLOWSTONE February 2013 Visit us online @ www.caves.org/grotto/cullman/ Volume 20, Issue 2 or www.cullmangrotto.com Inside this Issue The Flowstone is published monthly by the Cullman Grotto of the National Speleological Society. Items submitted for publication must be received by the 20th of Echo Chamber each month for inclusion in the following month‟s issue. 2 The Cullman Grotto will exchange by request with any publishing grotto. Republication of items within The Flowstone is allowed provided credit is given to TAG Calendar author and source. 4 Graves Cave -- Membership to the Cullman Grotto is fifteen dollars ($15) per year for individual or January 5, 2013 twenty dollars ($20) per year for family. Dues are payable at the first grotto meeting of each year (January) and includes subscription to The Flowstone. Subscription rate for non-members is fifteen dollars ($15) per year. White Nose Syndrome The Cullman Grotto meets on the first Monday of each month unless the first Monday 5 Fungus Persists… falls on a holiday or otherwise noted. In those cases the meeting will be held on the second Monday. Meetings begin at 7:30 p.m. and are held at the old L&N train depot, Arnold St., Cullman, AL. All visitors and prospective members are welcome. 6 Minutes Official Grotto Address Newsletter Exchange Cullman Grotto The Flowstone c/o Harold Calvert Perry or Sharon Clayton 123 Co. Rd. 250 1628 Edmondson Rd Cullman, AL 35057 Hanceville, AL 35077 [email protected] [email protected] 2013 OFFICERS APPOINTMENTS Membership/ Chairman: Vice Chair: Advisor: Library Harold Calvert Perry Clayton Victor Bradford David Drake 123 Co. Rd 250 1628 Edmondson Rd. 8333 US Hwy 31 110 Co. Rd. 1386 Cullman, AL 35057 Hanceville, AL 35077 Hanceville, AL 35077 Falkville, AL 35622 (256) 287-9770 (256) 595-2548 by carrier pigeon only (256) 739-0811 [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] Secretary: Treasurer: Safety: Webmaster Sharon Clayton Tracy Calvert Scott Murphy Kuenn Drake Front Cover: Flowstone in 1628 Edmondson Rd. 123 Co. Rd. 250 156 Mount Tabor Road 100 Co. Rd. 1386 Grave’s Cave, Blount Co. AL Hanceville, AL 35077 Cullman, AL 35057 Hartselle, AL 35640 Falkville, AL 35622 . (256)352-0235 (256)287-9770 (256) 531-3230 (256) 739-6915 Photo by: Kuenn Drake [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] February 2013 Cullman Grotto Flowstone help us get the new headquarters whether or not the Walls2D viewer is ECHO))))) CHAMBER ready for the renovations. We will launched and, as suggested by Jeff begin at 8 AM Saturday and there Bartlett, the listing of the survey will be dinner and beer for all vector experiencing the greatest NSS 2013 Convention volunteers who can come. Indoor endpoint coordinate change along Registration camping is available. with the amount it was shifted. By: Bill Jackson (Evans, Georgia) If the weather is scaring you away Also thanks to Jeff Bartlett, 2013-01- [email protected] this weekend, the next scheduled 29 also includes support for the SVG weekend is February 23rd. This is <pattern> element which allows use your chance to show the NSS what of pattern fills for objects in any the SERA cavers can accomplish. adjustable layer. 6001 Pulaski Pike, Huntsville Available for Windows, Walls is freeware developed by David McKenzie. For more information, including the full change log, or to grab yourself a copy, visit the Walls website. At long last, the on-line registration Walls Cave Survey Tool system for the 2013 NSS Convention Releases Build 2013-01-29 in Shippensburg, PA is officially up February 1, 2013 and ready for orders. Register on- line at http://nss2013.caves.org/registration/ 2013 SERA WINTER index.php or postmark a printed form BUSINESS MEETING by Thursday, January 31st for the CUMBERLAND CAVERNS cheapest convention rates. Rates go FEBRUARY 15 – 17, 2013 up on Friday, February 1st. The dates of the Convention are August 5-9, 2013. Please help spread the news. Screenshot via the Walls Manual The other day Walls, the popular cave survey data management tool, Come enjoy an adventure-filled NSS HQ Work Days saw its first update in almost two meeting, camping, cave trips, and By: Maureen Handler (Sewanee, years. Walls Version 2, B8 Release, conservation cleanup deep Tennessee) Build 2013-01-29 includes several underground beneath Cardwell [email protected] tweaks, but the biggest changes come Mountain in Warren County, to its SVG export feature. Tennessee. A suggestion by Peter Sprouse Meeting sign-in and set-up begins at prompted an enhancement to support 9:30 a.m. on Saturday, February 16, merging of artwork from two 2013; Meeting starts at 10:00a.m.; separate SVG files. This change Banquet starts at 6:00 p.m. Banquet represents a major upgrade to the speakers will include former cave Walls‟ roundtripping capability, guides from Cumberland telling large which also saw a fix to properly stories about Cumberland and other adjust Adobe Illustrator live paint caves, cavers, and each other! We are still on for the NSS objects thanks to help from Aaron Headquarters work weekend this Addison. *Extensive cave trips in Cumberland Saturday & Sunday, ice and snow Caverns are offered for $15 per will not stop us! Come on down and Other SVG export improvements person on Friday and Saturday. Trip include displaying adjustment details 2 February 2013 Cullman Grotto Flowstone descriptions and registration form is Once thru this crawl way you will Ancient Bone DNA Shows attached separately to this meeting emerge into the beginning of the Ancestry of Modern Asians registration form. Northwest Passage. This will be a SKTF Cave Clean-up will occur in long tour so you need to pack a snack & Native Americans Cumberland Caverns on Sunday, for the trip. GEAR NEEDED!! You January 31, 2013 / China February 17, 2013 at 9:00 a.m. will only need your normal caving gear for this tour; no vertical gear is TRIP 1: MCRADY/BALLS PIT needed. However, if you are not able (duration 3-4 hours) to crawl for 200 feet at a time or have Friday Feb 15TH, Departs at 6:00 problems crawling for long periods, PM from Cumberland Caverns this is not the trip for you!! Ticket Office This trip will be a through trip that TRIP 3: BILL'S BLVD. (duration 6 starts in the back of the commercial hours) tour, heads through the Bone Room Saturday Feb 16TH, Departs at 9:00 up Blue Mud Mountain and into AM from Cumberland Caverns Grand Hall. Once into Grand Hall Ticket Office Photo via Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology you will do a short 30 ft rappel into This trip will be to Bills Blvd. and and Paleoanthropology, Beijing Mcrady Canyon. This passage is a will also start at the back of the Analysis of DNA from a bone tall canyon pass that leads you up Mountain room. At this point the trip unearthed in a cave near Beijing, and down some challenging free will head through the Bone Room China has discovered a common climbs with ropes and ladders in the and up Blue Mud Mountain and into origin with the ancestors of many places that need them. This tall Grand Hall. You will pass by the present-day Asians and Native canyon passage will lead you to the Rock of Ages and cross the room to Americans. back of the 10 Acre Room. Here you the entrance to the Yale Discovery. will enter into the upper Balls Pit Once through the small hole you will An international team of researchers trail where you will follow the same work your way back to the Discovery extracted nuclear and mitochondrial path that Donald Ball traveled the of 76. This passage has been DNA from the 40,000 year old leg night he fell in Cumberland Caverns. enlarged so that most can fit thru the bone found in 2003 at the Tianyuan Once you arrive at the top of Balls tight crawl-way. Once thru the crawl, Cave site located outside Beijing. Pit you will rappel 40 feet to the you will enter into McKinney Hall Using new techniques that can bottom and return to the volcano and cross this large breakdown room identify ancient genetic material room via the famous Rocky Topper to the far corner where you will enter from an archaeological find, the wild tour route. To do this trip you into Bill's Blvd. This passage is a tall scientists were able to reconstruct a must have your own vertical caving canyon passage that leads you genetic profile of the leg‟s owner. gear, and helmet and light. through some narrow formation VERTICAL GEAR NEEDED!! filled areas. There are lots of up “This individual lived during an SEAT HARNESS, FIGURE 8, OR and down climbs in this passage. If important evolutionary transition RACK, SAFTEY, HELMET AND you are not comfortable with when early modern humans, who LIGHT. exposed free climbs with no ropes shared certain features with earlier or ladders this is not the trip for forms such as Neanderthals, were TRIP 2: NORTH WEST you!! Once to the end of Bills Blvd. replacing Neanderthals and PASSAGE (duration 6-8 hours) you will enter Herschend Hall. The Denisovans, who later became Saturday Feb 16TH, Departs at 9:00 trip will then return via the same extinct.” said Svante Pääbo, AM from Cumberland Caverns route. GEAR NEEDED!! No Researcher at the Max Planck Ticket Office vertical gear is needed for this trip.