Speleothem Removal....

[Scott McCrea]

Maybe instead of trying to salvage formations from a doomed cave, it migh be better to fully document the cave with a survey (map), great photos and video. Then you can say, "Look what we lost. Let's don't let it happen again."

[cob]

Rock collectors routinely collect the information of when and where and by whom specimens were collected, so the argument that 'no one would know where it came from' doesn't wash. Especially if specimens are collected for a reseach collection.

Teresa, this an attempt to explain why I make "blanket statements". I apologize for breaking this up into seperate posts.

For starters, I have been to dozens of flea markets where I found "collections" (of rocks and minerals, not necassarily formations) for sale, no info on when, where, or by whom they were collected. Indeed, I have several nice specimans of minerals (and just plain "rocks") on my mantle. No documentation. Just me (until I die).

A friend of mine who until recently owned a reputable "rock shop" in Jasper, Arkansas, has given me several specimens (never a cave formation, he would not touch such a thing, he is a caver), none of those specimens came with a (for lack of better terms) "bibliography". Indeed of the things he had in his shop, I doubt very much he could say with any kind of certainty where 20-30 % of his rocks came from.

MOST specimens are not collected for research purposes... people take them because they look "cool"

"No one knows where they come from"... it washes, and it wears.

tom

[cob]

It's not a popular position, but I have no problem with stal being removed with permission from active commercial quarries or mines. They are specifically not protected under FCRPA, (See section under vugs or mines) and some (not all) cave laws, although property rights (permission of the owner) still applies. It is definitely better than breaking stal and laws by removing them from protected caves.

On a logical level Teresa, I can not help but agree with you... until it comes to the final statement in your above paragraph.

As a caver, I want the totally and completely unachievable goal of protecting all caves. This is not possible (land owner rights) so I settle for the very achievable goal of protecting the caves of land owners who want to protect their caves. The question comes down to a matter of "How?"

I am at present involved in a project for finding, documenting and mapping all the caves on the property of the largest private landowner in the state of Missouri (wanna join us? we got room...) The LAD Foundation owns over 70,000 acres, their caves are many and varied, and unfortunately, very difficult to protect. Among all of their mission statements, protecting their caves is only one small part of it, and they need all the help they can get.

Here is the rub: All of their caves are legally protected... but 2 jewels of the Ozarks were not protected in reality until we gated them. And here is the double rub: I started going down to that area 20+ yrs ago and got to know more than a few of the locals. They love that land. And the caves on it....

Ahhh, I digress. That is another story of ATV'ers from outside of the area coming in. (and I suspect you know more than a little of that story, as you are fron STL), the truth is me and mine can still go... the "locals" can't and their claim is at least as strong as mine.

This discussion is about protecting all caves. Not just the "protected" ones.

[cob]

Increasingly, geology enthusiasts are visiting sites and doing photography, (partly do to lack of space in modern homes) just as many former hunters are now wildlife photographers, preferring to bring home pictures instead of hauling home a lion carcass to taxidermy and put it in the living room. Excessive collection or cleaning out a location has always been looked upon as being greedy.

Cavers would do better to promote responsibility in regards to collecting and obeying existing laws (remember "scientific, selective and minimal"?) as opposed to making blanket statements.

The first above paragraph could (almost) be paraphrased as "Take nothing but pictures, kill nothing but time, leave nothing but photographs"

Why not just say that? Instead of saying "Raping a sight is unacceptable." Why collect at all, if a photo will suffice?

As to the last paragraph;

Responsibilty is what we are talking about...
But define it?

Existing laws are inadequate...
I can catch somebody redhanded exiting a "private cave" with speleothems and get nowhere prosecuting them, because the prosecuter won't push it (PROVE the speleothems came from the cave in question???)(true story: In Chinn Springs down in Ark some kids got in, destroying the gates, spray painted the walls with their names even, and the prosecuter would NOT prosecute!! He said he had more pressing matters... namely meth...)

Define "selective and minimal"...
I will (with a blanket statement): None. NO speleothems, because the alternative is a whole lot of gray areas that rend the black and white areas unenforceable.

tom

[Ralph E. Powers]

Maybe instead of trying to salvage formations from a doomed cave, it migh be better to fully document the cave with a survey (map), great photos and video. Then you can say, "Look what we lost. Let's don't let it happen again."

Amen! My thoughts exactly.
Try to SAVE the cave itself. Find reasons WHY it's important to save it and take that to whomever CAN save it... if not... get busy doing what was suggested above.

[bigalpha]

Well, what if you cannot SAVE the cave? What if it is going to meet it's demise whether you want to save it or not? e.g. highway building right on top of it?

[cob]

Well, what if you cannot SAVE the cave? What if it is going to meet it's demise whether you want to save it or not? e.g. highway building right on top of it?

Map it, photograph it, document it... and then build a monument to another irreplaceable loss to the insatiable appetites of progress. Maybe if enough such monuments get "built" people will begin to think about what is being lost and wonder at the true costs of "progress".

It is interesting that the analogy of highway projects is being repeated. Some years back a buddy of mine found a cave down in Shannon Co. on private land with in the boundaries of the Ozark National Scenic Riverways. A very special cave, large, long, and beautiful. My knowledge of the specifics is a little hazy so forgive me if I am incorrect on some of the details. This cave, totally new, totally virgin, was also home to several rare, threatened or endangered species, including but not limited to, blind crayfish and blind cavefish.

He found it and put together a crew of people to survey it and document it, and over the next couple of years they did so. As these things go it was not exactly smooth sailing through out the project, and while there were some disagreements along the way, one thing was always honored... the secrecy of the project. The fragility of this cave was feared above all else and so they told no one.

This later created some hard feelings (my interpretation of some things I was hearing) among some within the caving community, because as fate would have it, MODOT decided to rebuild a bridge on a nearby highway and straighten out the approaches to the bridge, a major project which would have a direct and deleterious affect on this cave. My friends' hands were forced and they had to go public with the cave before they were ready (as to the why's and wherefor's of the decisions they made... this was the source of some of the hard feelings and as I was not party to any of it I can not say who was right or wrong). The problem was that MODOT had done their engineering based on the "known" factors, done their EIS based on what they got from the NPS, MDC, the MSS and others.

This "new" cave was a HUGE wrench thrown into the works. And MODOT was very resistant to changing the design of this project. Yet because of the work (documentation) my friends had already done, they were able to convince certain people who's voices might have a little more weight in such a discussion (one was Dr. Bill Elliot, MDC's cave Biologist, another was Phillip Moss who did the dye tracing), to look at it, be convinced (it wasn't hard), and let their voices be heard.

Long and short of this story is that thru the cooperative efforts of many people, just regular every day cavers first off and foremost among them (who came together because the cave was more important than their "feelings" or personalities), the project did end up getting redesigned in certain aspects for the sole reason of protecting this cave.

And that after all, is what we are all about... I hope.

tom

ps: to clarify, I was not involved in this project in any way and so quite a bit of what I "know" (concerning the particulars) is based on 2nd or even 3rd hand knowledge. If there are others, with a sharper grasp of the facts, by all means correct me.

[Teresa]

Increasingly, geology enthusiasts are visiting sites and doing photography, (partly do to lack of space in modern homes) just as many former hunters are now wildlife photographers, preferring to bring home pictures instead of hauling home a lion carcass to taxidermy and put it in the living room. Excessive collection or cleaning out a location has always been looked upon as being greedy.

Cavers would do better to promote responsibility in regards to collecting and obeying existing laws (remember "scientific, selective and minimal"?) as opposed to making blanket statements.

Why not just say that? Instead of saying "Raping a site is unacceptable." Why collect at all, if a photo will suffice?

Collecting is essential to science. Most geological process/rock ID techniques are destructive. Like many other things, miniaturization has made great progress--- for example, it used to take great quantities of material to do mass spec analysis--now, a few grams of material suffice. Collecting also goes on for three other reasons: to satisfy human acquisitiveness and possessiveness, aesthetic (decoration of home and body) and for protection from vandalism and ease of study (if the rock is in the house, it's less likely to be smashed to bits, and easier to examine than if it is in an outcrop 500 miles away.) Collecting fills an emotional need in some people--probably left over from hunter-gatherer times.

Most cavers have sublimated the acquisitiveness/asthetic urges and worked on the protection problem by working to control access. They have made great strides in convincing university science to extract more information from smaller samples. Those who brave the ire of other cavers/rockhounds by appropriately being both are working hard to nudge recreational rock collectors to a more conservative ethic--http://www.amfed.org/ethics.htm. This isn't going to happen overnight. Hey, cave protection took a hundred years to implement, and we're not there yet. But cavers who go ballistic about stal taken from mines/quarries which are going to be destroyed don't help the long-range cause. Think of it as slowly boiling the frog...

Most of the people I know who haul large non-cave rocks or multiple samples from geology field trips are teachers with classrooms of kids who can't go on the field trips, and many of whom have seen very few rocks in person. Sounds weird, but with kids being increasingly kept inside, it's the truth. Why samples and not photos? Because it is real and not virtual. The same reason scoutleaders want to take their charges underground, instead of just giving them a slideshow.

Existing laws are inadequate...
I can catch somebody redhanded exiting a "private cave" with speleothems and get nowhere prosecuting them, because the prosecuter won't push it (PROVE the speleothems came from the cave in question???)(true story: In Chinn Springs down in Ark some kids got in, destroying the gates, spray painted the walls with their names even, and the prosecuter would NOT prosecute!! He said he had more pressing matters... namely meth...)

The laws are perfectly fine--they need to balance property rights with society's interests. It's prosecution (and public desire for it) which is inadequate. The landowners need to be motivated, since only they have standing in most "stal as personal property" cases. Lack of motivation goes back to public education--and geology/karst education in most K-12 public schools in the US is pitiful. People don't care about things they don't know about, and won't lift a finger to preserve them if they are taught all their lives they are valueless per se (like rocks). More people turn out to protect animals and other people because they have been taught to care about them. Prosecution of existing cave laws isn't going to get better until people demand it.

Define "selective and minimal"...
I will (with a blanket statement): None. NO speleothems, because the alternative is a whole lot of gray areas that rend the black and white areas unenforceable.

I respectfully disagree with you, cob. You can kill someone, and get a medal if you are soldier, off scott-free if self-defense, a couple years if the gun goes off accidentally, and a cot on Death Row if found to be premeditated with malice. But the black and white is someone isn't breathing anymore on account of one's actions.

I agree the devil is in the details. I'm perfectly happy to protect and preserve caves, work towards getting the most possible data from minimal collection from caves and work towards changing rock collection ethics to more responsible behavior. I'm not willing say all collection is wrong, at all times and for all reasons.

Wanna help the effort? Work towards getting cave stal labeled as "Leaverite", but recognize there is a difference between responsible collection and kleptomania.


best
Teresa

[cob]

I agree the devil is in the details. I'm perfectly happy to protect and preserve caves, work towards getting the most possible data from minimal collection from caves and work towards changing rock collection ethics to more responsible behavior. I'm not willing say all collection is wrong, at all times and for all reasons.

Wanna help the effort? Work towards getting cave stal labeled as "Leaverite", but recognize there is a difference between responsible collection and kleptomania.


best
Teresa

As is so often the case Teresa, there is not so much difference between our positions as at first appears.

Let me start by making a distinction I have as yet failed to do: Yes there is a difference between collecting for science and collecting to satisfy our acquisitive nature. But as you yourself said, scientists want the speleothems in cave. I rather suspect there is not much (if any) scientific value to a speleothem out of cave.

My point is this: Somebody sees a stal and thinks, "Cool! I want one too." Then they go out and get one, thinking "This one won't hurt." And so does the next collector, and the next, and the next... You get my point.

You are absolutely right about the state of education in the country and the fact that people care more about animals than they do about karst (in the above case I mentioned, does anybody really think MODOT would have changed their highway plans without the blind cavefish and crayfish?)

But I do not believe for a second that the laws are fine as they are, because if you can't get them enforced, what good are they? In the Chinn Springs case, it was the landowner who was unable to get the law enforced. Where are the property rights there? (and I know of other cases where landowners were shown the door) There is a thing in this country(not to stir up another hornets nest) called "prosecutorial discretion". Once you run into it, it is all but impossible to move it.


And the problem we have is that I don't think I or any one else can tell just by looking where a speleothem came from. Maybe the law (as the law does with certain endangered species) can set up a licensing/collection process where there is a paper trail? Of course, even then there would be a grandfather clause, and that would be a loophole.

These are not easy things to change, because it involves the most basic attitudes people have. I just feel that if we as cavers say, hey it's ok in one instance, we make it even harder to say it isn't in others. We need to draw a line. As to where that line should be...

tom