Cave Files Report July thru December 2014
Missouri Speleological Survey
Files Report for July – December 2014
Much work has been done and projects are booming. A lot of this work is a result of agreements with various government agencies, including the Mark Twain National Forest, Ozark National Scenic Riverways, Missouri State Parks, Missouri Department of Transportation, and local government units. Now, with permits to continue work in a limited number of Missouri Department of Conservation caves, things will be busy for some time to come.
We demonstrated the cave database and new, attendant cave fauna module at a bat survey coordination meeting in November. As a result of that demo, the US Fish and Wildlife Survey has sent financial support for an important project that many of us need to work on: despite years of getting better locations we still have ~2300 caves in the state that do not have point locations in the data because the locations are in the Public Land Survey System (PLSS but sometimes referred to as a “legal” or cadastral or rectangular system). A computer projection by Hal Baker several years back gave us point locations for many of these, but these are only estimates by a machine based on what information it could interpolate. People who know caves can modify those locations or at least evaluate the quality of those locations based on what else we know – written directions to the cave are critical. As many of the cognoscenti are aware, we have a point quality system in place, which we will use to classify these point locations and improve upon them. The goal, within a year, is to have a qualified point location for every cave within our database.
The usefulness of our data also came to life in an inter-agency meeting concerning a new highway project just outside of Perryville. Concerns over the location of this road and its likely impacts on the passages and drainages of some of our largest and best caves led to this meeting which involved MSS/CRF members Bob Osburn, Paul Hauck, Stan Sides, and I plus representatives of MoDoT, MDC, US Fish and Wildlife Service, Federal Highway Administration, and the City of Perryville. Discussion and a follow-up field trip showed weaknesses in the original layout of the road. Further design work, including cave work, will hopefully help mitigate the effects of the road. Further, MSS has a proposal in to the City of Perryville for re-visiting work on caves underneath the city. A big thanks to Jim Sherrell for his help in setting this up. The City of Perryville has some really good people working for them, and we want to help them manage their karst resources as much as we can.
Mick Sutton sent in a new cave location in Crawford County, from a lead supplied by U.S. Forest Service, Mark Twain National Forest. Mick also submitted maps of the following MTNF caves: Camp Cave, Canyon Cave, and Fifty-Foot Cave, all in Ozark County; and Dry Cave, Howell County. Plus Mick sent a map of Crane Pond Creek Cave in Iron County. Mick has also done yeoman work for the past year on revising the cave fauna module, reassigning numbers, standardizing entries, and eliminating duplications.
Doug Baker sent in a map of Owls Bend Cave in Shannon County. He and I mapped this some years ago and the map must have been lost in transmittal.
Jon Beard has been busy. He spent time digitizing various maps and photographs from the Missouri Speleology on shelter caves in western Missouri. Many of these were not in the files yet. Jon sent reports on three caves in Stone County, two of them on MODOT right-of-way, and he sent three new cave locations for Barry County, on MTNF land. And he sent an entire list of Dade County caves corrected for UTM coordinates, the creation of which is a big goal for the cave files. Plus Jon updated the main database with complete records from Greene County. And there was a correction to cave locations at Battle of Carthage State Historic Site, which resulted in a removal of three cave numbers as they were either connected or too short to be caves. Plus he sent a write up on the entrance of Carrico Cave. He had time for maps as well: Lignite Cave from Roaring River State Park in Barry County, plus Carter Cave in Jasper County and Bennett Spring Natural Tunnel in Laclede County, all on State Parks lands which work was done under a new agreement with DNR. From Mark Twain National Forest lands there were maps of: Hay Holler Cave in Howell County; plus Standing Joint Cave, Pool Shelter, Hidden Salamander Cave, Mosquito Cave and Frogtite Cave in Barry County.
Gary Johnson sent an entire Hickory County database (FileMaker) file plus a data file with locations for graphics use. This material represents a lot of work over several years.
Josh Brewer sent piles of maps. Josh is drawing up some of his own but a lot of surveys done by other people, so here we go: On MTNF land in Barry County: Fairy Cave and Mushroom Rock Cave; From Taney County there were: Green Seventeen Cave, Bald Knobber Cave, and Lost Minor Cave. From Barry County Josh sent: Hidden Entrance Cave, Red Rock Cave, Belly Dipper Cave, and Tree Peeker Cave. From Stone County: Pleasant Valley Road Cave, Portal Sink Cave, and Powerline Cave.
Edmund Tucker sent a nice cave reports on a trip to Blackfathom River Cave in Ste. Genevieve County, plus a report on another cave in the same county. Edmund also sent a photo of Coyote Pit, Perry County.
Michael Bradford sent a nice map of Huffman Cave on MTNF land in Phelps County.
Paul Hauck sent a detailed trip reports on several surveys in Crevice Cave, Perry County. Paul also sent overlays showing the relationship between cave passages and overlying topography near the Crevice entrance.
Richard Young sent a description of a forest service cave in Oregon County. Richard also sent a detailed cultural report on an Ozark Riverways cave that was once used as a still. And Richard sent detailed cultural reports on several caves on MTNF land in Ozark County.
Ben Miller sent a map of Glade Pit on MTNF land in Barry County. Ben also sent reports on two new caves from Taney County and locations for four more. Plus there was a map of Dogwood Blossom Cave from MTNF land in Barry County and a map of Echo Tube, also in Barry County. Ben also sent maps of Right of Way Cave, Possum Lair Cave, and Bluff Willow Cave, all in Stone Co, on MODOT right of way. And he submitted maps of Indian Bluff Cave, and Clevenger Pit in Taney County and locations of new caves from Taney County.
Jim Cooley sent reports by himself and Ken Grush on Flippen Cave, Benton County. Jim sent several new cave reports from Ripley County and another eleven from Oregon County written by himself and Ken Grush. Jim sent maps of Turtle Shell Pit in Ripley County, plus One Room Pit, Cassiopeia Tunnel, Biss Critter Crawl Cave, Balanced Rocks Cave, and High Canyon Cave in Oregon County on MTNF land. Plus there were maps of Patsie Lewis Brown Cave, Woodrow’s Cave, Believe it or Not Cave, and Worrell Spring Cave in Ripley near Lewis Cave. And he sent maps of Elbow Cave, Looks Nice in Ice in Oregon County. Jim and Ken turned in FileMaker reports on four new caves in Oregon County.
Mark Jones sent more trip reports on caves in numerous counties. These detailed reports get added into the database.
Chad McCain sent photos and information on a pair of MTNF caves in Howell County, and a new cave location from the Ozark Riverways.
Don Dunham sent information on a Perry County cave, long closed to cavers.
Joe Sikorski sent photo of a large spring/cave in the Ozark Riverways.
Rhonda Rimer of MDC sent a report of bat occurrences at a cave in Greene County. And Rhonda sent new material for the files from four caves in Hickory County, continuing the support we have had from MDC.
Joe Light sent a directional map for Skaggs Cave. Joe also sent a report on Wainwright Cave in St. Louis.
Ken Grush sent a completely revised Phelps County FileMaker file. Ken also scanned and sent in several Richard Thompson maps from Polk County that had never made it into the maps files. Ken also turned in eight caves from Henry County, a result of his field work years ago and a trip he took in 2008. Ken followed this up with a revised FileMaker database file for Henry County.
Rob Kavaliauskas sent a report and photos on a Perry County cave with interesting salamanders.
Dan Lamping sent in a beautiful final map draft of Lawrence Hollow Pit in Shannon County. He also sent an early draft of Wallace Cave in the Ozark Riverways, Shannon County.
Jim Sherrell sent in a revised, improved location for a Crawford County cave. And he sent a sinkhole map for Perryville.
Kayla Sapkota sent a map of Sugar Silver Cave, Barry County.
Matt Bumgardner sent photos of a new cave on MTNF land in Barry County. Plus Matt sent in a variety of photographs from caves in Ozark and Howell Counties as well.
New caves showed up from Dent County. An MDC/MSS crew found at least three new caves, two on private properties and one on MDC. Susan Farrington and Shelly Colatskie sent these locations in, along with photos.
Stan Sides sent in a location, description, and photos of a cave in Wayne County. Many Boy Scouts have told us about it over the years but we never had a firm location. People still ask where we can find new caves: Wayne County has sections of three rivers (Castor, Black, and St. Francois) in it, several very deep spring caves, and yet we only have 24 caves recorded from the entire county. Stan also sent some early photos from Crevice Cave plus information on another cave entrance nearby. And Stan sent copies of surveys from Dorothy Taylor Cave over to another nearby cave.
Spike Crews sent photographs and reports for several MTNF caves in the Rolla area, a result of MSM monitoring caves through the CRF agreement.
Bob Osburn sent a new map and topographic overlay of Branson Cave, Ozark Riverways in Shannon County. He followed this up with a map of Mose Prater Chimney Cave, also in the Riverways.
Scott House (yep, me) turned in maps of Dry Cave, Hidden Canyon Cave, Pigeon Falls Cave, Hicks Spring Natural Bridge, Cist Cave, Window Cave, Bat Cave Shelter, and Marys Hollow Cave, all in Ozark County; Noblett Creek Spring Cave and Plum Seed Cavelet in Douglas County; and Tabor Cave and Springhouse Cave in Howell County – all on Mark Twain National Forest land. I also wrote a load of new reports for the files but I can’t keep track of themJ
Busy year this was, with many new maps, nearly 90 new caves, and thousands of corrections, additional data, descriptions, photos, etc.
See you at the Winter meeting of the MSS.
Scott House
Missouri Cave Database
1606 Luce St.
Cape Girardeau MO 63701
573-651-3782