Gated Caves

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Re: Gated Caves

Postby MUD » Feb 18, 2015 10:55 am

:big grin: I don't own 4 wheelers or any type of motor bike. I like to walk and occasionally ride one of the horses. We have about 2.5 miles of trails right here on our property that we built just for walking/horseback. Several of these trails go by springs, marshes and waterfalls. No worries on the mess those motorized things make here! In the Spring we hear the peepers too and really enjoy them. We also enjoy our herds of deer, flocks of turkeys, hawks and other myriad of woodland creatures.

LOL Jonah! :laughing: You and your family are welcome here anytime! I think many of us here on Cavechat would miss you if you were to leave. Your writings are great and we really enjoy them.

Gated caves? Wasn't that the original topic lol? As someone who has gated a few caves I will say this. Every single cave I have ever gated or help to gate was dug open. The landowners wanted them gated. In my mind as a landowner....do what they ask of you while on their property! I've been caving for nearly 43 years and have never been kicked off of a cave property by the landowner. Respect their land and wishes cavers!!! :grin:
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Re: Gated Caves

Postby Chads93GT » Feb 18, 2015 11:00 am

Same Cavemud. Only gate I have ever installed was to a 113' pit we dug into and the owner wanted it gated after we broke into it.
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Re: Gated Caves

Postby GroundquestMSA » Feb 18, 2015 11:59 am

Chads93GT wrote:Sorry, I am simply being realistic, not philosophical.


I get that. And realistically, you are right. I feel that there is some value, though, in seeing the inadequacies of society, and in imagining how things could and should be. The industrialization of farming for example, is terribly detrimental to the health of the soil, and the health of the people who eat its produce. Farmers feed us, you say, and they do. But many better minds than mine have recognized that our personal abandonment of food growth and preparation is bad for us in all kinds of ways. So while multi-thousand acre farms are needed to keep society as it is going, they are not needed to feed us, and we would be much much better off as a society and as individuals without them.

Similarly, the frequent inability of the law to uphold right should be recognized.
Chads93GT wrote:This isn't the United Socialist States of America. People have the freedom to buy as much land and do with it as they please.
At one time in these "United States" people had the freedom to buy other humans and do with them as they pleased. The laws on the books upheld that legal right. Are you willing to defend that barbarism simply because it was legal? Would you call one who recognized and spoke of the moral problems with slavery in say, 1790, stupid, simply because immediate positive results were unrealistic?
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Re: Gated Caves

Postby LukeM » Feb 18, 2015 12:03 pm

Chad, you seem to be ignoring the fact that the laws on the books, prevailing attitudes, and our culture are all man-made and are subject to change as "we the people" see fit. The idea of land ownership, or how land ownership should work is something that is viewed differently in every culture. It's codified in law, not handed down from on high. That is to say, there are many, many ways of looking at it and there's no default "right" way.

I'm not sure why property laws get so much respect but laws that protect the environment somehow get lumped in with "socialist" ideology or some such. The way I see it the environment has much more of a right to be respected than landowners do, being that we derive all of our means of living from it. We are first and foremost stewards of the land, and secondarily owners. Without the former attitude we risk ruining everything we have, and no one has that right.

If you think the way a farmer (or anyone) is treating the land is damaging to the environment by all means, try to change their mind or advocate for a new law. That's how it's supposed to work! Why would you stand by and watch while they screw up your great-grandchildren's inheritance?
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Re: Gated Caves

Postby Chads93GT » Feb 18, 2015 12:36 pm

Protecting land is one thing. Telling someone that they cant own more than 100 acres is just downright ignorant. Even small time farmers I know own 3-5-700 acres and they are small time. Other farmers and farmer families that I know and grew up with own anywhere from 1500-3500 acres and even they are small time farmers.

I realize that laws change as society evolves and that is a good thing. After all, our society has evolved as a whole on slavery, womens rights, voting rights, gay marriage, etc and that is great!

I am simply pointing out, ignoring trespassing signs just because you feel they dont pertain to you, is a very poor image to portray, especially on a public NSS board that anyone can read (landowners???)

Respect people's land rights. If they allow you on, great, If not well..........there are about 500,000 more caves on the planet you can visit. Its not worth getting arrested to see that one cave that is posted or gated. Is it?
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Re: Gated Caves

Postby GroundquestMSA » Feb 18, 2015 12:55 pm

Chads93GT wrote: Its not worth getting arrested to see that one cave that is posted or gated. Is it?

Nope, and it's not worth hurting feelings either.
Again, the only reason this came up was to illustrate that even if a gate is decided to be the best way to care for a particular cave, it cannot do its job if it doesn't keep people out. If I can easily get in, so can lots of other people, and they may not be so kind to the cave. I'm not advocating anything. I would give the full horrific tale of each gate I have breached so you could see things from my perspective, but I'm quite sure that would be a waste of effort.
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Re: Gated Caves

Postby Chads93GT » Feb 18, 2015 1:12 pm

We've all pushed the envelope. Some things are best not spoken online ;)
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Re: Gated Caves

Postby tncaver » Feb 18, 2015 1:17 pm

If it were not for land ownership laws here in the United States, then anyone could come along and plow up your field of corn or mow down your barn and house to mine rock. Basically, there would be bedlam. However, if the US were a socialist or communist country, then the gov't could
say who gets what. Somehow I doubt that would work out very well. Favoritism would flourish and the masses would own nothing. Also, some
communist countries are terrible environmentalists. China for example. The air is bad and the land is polluted as well in China. I personally,
prefer the USA even with all it's faults.
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Re: Gated Caves

Postby LukeM » Feb 18, 2015 2:49 pm

TN, pure communism is an extreme end of a very wide spectrum. For some good reading about the precedents for public access to private land, rights of way, public thoroughfares, etc I'd recommend checking out the Wikipedia article on freedom to roam or everyman's rights. Many countries have policies where the public can camp, fish, etc on private land provided certain conditions are met such as minimum proximity to dwellings, not harming the environment, and so on. In the UK there's a longstanding tradition of "green lanes", basically public paths that go through private property. Much of the rest of Europe has their own version of green lanes. These routes have existed since before property was defined in law and have been honored over hundreds of years.

The Europeans that founded this country could have easily brought some of these principles over with them but for some reason it didn't happen, despite the fact that we had more land than we knew what to do with.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_to_roam
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Re: Gated Caves

Postby tncaver » Feb 18, 2015 3:03 pm

I didn't say anything about PURE commuism. We don't have a PURE democracy here in the US either. Here in the US there are lots of
right of way situations for utilities and access for land locked properties. Even for greenways that cross public and private land.
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Re: Gated Caves

Postby LukeM » Feb 18, 2015 3:10 pm

I was just trying to provide some examples of all the things that fall in between private property completely controlled by the owner and the government controlling all resources, which you have to admit is a hyperbolic example given what we've been talking about.

Isn't a typical right of way in the US owned by someone else other than the surrounding landowner? So in the case of a utility, they purchase/seize a right of way through private land and then they control it themselves. It's not a case of the original owner still owning the land but having to allow others to use it which is what I was talking about.
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Gated Caves

Postby Ernie Coffman » Feb 18, 2015 3:20 pm

Hear, hear Chad! Right on the money was your comment. Right on the money...except that its not just in our time period, but back, historically, people who set out from the shores of the east coast, took the land by marking it off into sections...and more sections, so that's the way its been. And, like you wrote, we're not going to change it, whether we like it or not. I loved your analogy on the trespassing charge. Whew hoo!

Interesting that Jonah got to you, Bruce, as it got to me, also. The ATVs do tend to be misused in a lot of circumstances, but that's not to say every ATV rider acts like a total fool. In our SAR group, we use them for assisting us in trying to locate a missing subject. But, as Jonah wrote, his little secret pool was totally eaten up by these idiots who didn't give a hang. Nor will they give a hang, until they get themselves into trouble...and they probably will, someday down the road. We agree on your short story in this case, Jonah, but not on you "owning" the land just because you found a secret place to admire and appreciate. It just doesn't work that way, as Chad wrote in his answer to you. It's just too bad that a lot of parents don't instill some basic understanding in their children, as they grow and mature to adulthood. My caving buddy has a piece of land fairly close to where I'm located, so every once in awhile, I check on it for him, since he lives 500-miles from here and doesn't have the time to drive up here from Palo Alto all the time. Needless to say, some 4-wheelers (ATVers, if you will) who live in that area have torn down a fence between their property and my buddy, have made their own trails throughout the property and feel that since no one is around, they have access to a great ATV piece of land. I've placed limbs across their trails, etc., etc., but it doesn't do any good. Except time does, to some degree. They've matured to some degree and are either in jail, have moved on, or understand that it's no longer their "play site." The same can be said about a number of caves, which in the West, usually are on private lands. A good number of NSS cavers seek permission to go on that land, but the wild and wooly types who use zinc-carbon batteries in their flashlights, etc. tend to ruin it for a number of cavers, as they cross the property lines and go caving on their own and do whatever, until the property owner finally says "No more caving!" to everyone, so...that's just my thought for today.
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Re: Gated Caves

Postby tncaver » Feb 18, 2015 4:03 pm

LukeM wrote:I was just trying to provide some examples of all the things that fall in between private property completely controlled by the owner and the government controlling all resources, which you have to admit is a hyperbolic example given what we've been talking about.

Isn't a typical right of way in the US owned by someone else other than the surrounding landowner? So in the case of a utility, they purchase/seize a right of way through private land and then they control it themselves. It's not a case of the original owner still owning the land but having to allow others to use it which is what I was talking about.


I see what you mean. But there are voluntary rights of way granted by land owners who still own the land while allowing people to cross it.
Seems like that is exactly the case in Fiery Gizzard Cove. Some of the land from Foster Falls down the Fiery Gizzard trail is privately owned
with a voluntarily granted right of way for trail users.
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Re: Gated Caves

Postby GroundquestMSA » Feb 18, 2015 4:17 pm

Ernie Coffman wrote:We agree on your short story... but not on you "owning" the land. It just doesn't work that way, as Chad wrote in his answer to you.

I didn't claim to own anything. Did you read the words?
I think that most of us have some desire to care for our surroundings, but cave conservationists and caving culture have given a lot of lazy minds the wrong idea of what conservation is. Resultantly, there are a lot of careless people living without regard for the earth and its health, while at the same time calling themselves conservationists, just as there have always been lazy people who need the law to tell them right from wrong. There is a lot more to be said about land ownership, but most of it would have little to do with gating caves. If you Ernie, (or anyone else) want to talk about it privately that is ok.
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Re: Gated Caves

Postby batrotter » Feb 18, 2015 7:10 pm

"Interesting that Jonah got to you, Bruce, as it got to me, also. The ATVs do tend to be misused in a lot of circumstances, but that's not to say every ATV rider acts like a total fool."

True! I wouldn't mind having an ATV, but I don't want one to tear up some else's land or even my own land.
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