There is a new addition to the "Update" this issue, pictures! . All are recent scenic photos taken in Hurricane Crawl. Click on the thumbnail for a full sized view.

One features Greg Stock on the wall in Alcyone, named for the brightest star in the Pleiades Constellation. Note that the "white spots" on the photo are not a flaw but rather are sparkling crystal faces. Taken by Dave Bunnell.
The ricocheting helictite photos was taken by Steve Bumgardner. The long segment of this filamental helictite is about seven inches in length. It has formed more than 80 feet above the floor of Dusted Canyon on a narrow ledge.
The final picture is of Elizabeth Rousseau in Celaeno, another scenic room in the Pleiades. Taken by Dave Bunnell.

1998 Wrap-Up

Administration and Management

Crystal Cave Management Plan: The plan is now in final draft form and will be on the Superintendent's desk for signature and approval by the end of the year. The plan is complicated, and divides the cave's passages into six separate management designations. The commercial tours, operated by the Sequoia Natural History Association, are allowed only on the cave's paved trail. Wild Tour participants may be escorted to areas below Marble Hall, up to the Shield Room and in parts of the Catacombs. Cavers, led by Trustees, and off-duty SNHA employees may visit the wild tour areas and most other sections of the cave. However, some areas may only be visited when tours are not operating and a few spots may only be visited once per year, per Trustee or employee. There are also 30 different sections of the cave that are closed. Closed areas include the Oberhansley's Entrance, the Pool Room, Whitewash Canyon, and the Sugar Cookie Passage. These are set aside for a variety of reasons including bats habitat, invertebrate protection, and the protection of pristine and delicate areas.

The plan is made clear through the use of the new Crystal Cave maps. A color-coded set of maps has been created to show which areas are under what restrictions. These will be available to Trustees and the SNHA staff.

Cave Management Staffing: Seasonal Cave Specialist, Greg Stock, worked in the Parks for 18 weeks during the summer of 1998. His position was funded by money from the Cave Management Program base account, from surplus funds from "leave without pay", and from the Geologic Resources Division (GRD). The GRD money did come with strings. The funds were set aside to inventory abandoned mines, tailings piles and prospects.

Funding for seasonal staffing in 1999 remains in doubt. A Park-Service-wide initiative known as Resource Careers will absorb most discretional funding within the entire Resource Management Division at the Parks in 1999. Hopefully funds from the Geologic Resources Division to support survey and inventory in Soldier's Cave will provide funding for a seasonal employee in 1999.

Caving Projects

Crystal Cave Survey: Four years, 90 survey trips and thousands of hours of drafting time have brought the Park to the completion of the Crystal Cave Mapping Project. And what a finish it was! In July the maps received the Medal (first place) at the Cartographic Salon at the 1998 NSS Convention in Sewanee, Tennessee.

Now the Parks will use the maps as tools in the management and understanding of Crystal Cave. Maps have been produced to illustrate the new draft management plan for the cave. Another version will soon be going to print (more than a year late) for sale to visitors to the cave in 1999. Since the NSS Convention, maps have also been used to determine the distribution of biological monitoring plots in the cave and the locations of more than 90 shields within Crystal.

Crystal Cave Restoration: It was another fun and successful Crystal Cave Restoration weekend October 17 and 18. This year we focused on an old nemesis - the blast rubble in the Fault Room. Muscles strained and sweat flowed as 20 volunteers struggled to move the large rocks up to the cave trail and out to the surface. Most of the smaller rocks from this area have been removed now, and the cleared area is beginning to undermine the tour trail. Next year will require a new approach to this old problem, or perhaps a new project.

Crystal Cave Biology: Thirty-four biological monitoring plots have now been established in Crystal Cave. These are scattered through the cave's dry upper levels, as well as low wet levels, and can be found in sandy areas, on flowstone, in mud, or on breakdown. Each plot is .3m square and marked by flagging. They are checked by two observers watching for 10 minutes, or a single person watching for 20 minutes. All wildlife and organic matter noticed is recorded. The observations times also allowed photos to be taken of Crystal's invertebrate wildlife. Forty-two observations have been made on the plots and animals have been observed 13 times. Often the plots show no activity on a single observation, but over time it is hoped that they will provide a picture of the distribution and populations of the cave's invertebrate animals.

Soldier's Cave Mapping: Five mapping trips entered Soldier's Cave in the last seven months and have extended the cave's surveyed length to 2102 feet and to a depth of 260 feet. The survey work focused on areas near the Waiting Room including the Starlight Room area, the Contact Room and the Bacon Room. It is hoped that next summer funding will allow a concerted effort to be made on the cave's re-survey.

Hurricane Photography: As usual, there were four Hurricane Crawl photo trips this year. Dick LaForge and Mark Fritzke and other assistants took photos in two areas One trip traveled to the Star Chamber, an extensive well decorated upper level area. Another trip focused on the cave's lower levels and the cave's first formation rooms named for the stars Schedar and Caph. Dave Bunnell photographed the "back" rooms of the Pleiades area, which is another beautiful upper level area. Specifically, pictures were taken in the rooms Celaeno and Alycone named for two of the stars in the Pleiades. Bill Frantz continued his photo-documentation work in the Pumpkin Palace area about half way through the cave and on the lower level.

Hurricane Survey: A final survey trip went to the Pleiades area in August. A well decorated room and adjacent passages were surveyed, largely finishing the area. A few leads still exist in Hurricane but the best ones are challenging climbs. A new map of Hurricane Crawl is being drafted this winter and will appear in an upcoming issue of the NSS News.

Hurricane Dye-Trace: A dye trace test of Hurricane Crawl Cave was completed in June. Dye was placed in a flowing creek just upstream of a sink, which was believed to be the source for the cave's stream. Charcoal receptors were placed in all nearby streams and springs both on the surface and in the cave in preparation for the test. Dye was found in five of the dye receptors (known as bugs). The positive bugs had been placed in the large stream that briefly appears in the Mizar Maze, in the very small stream in Dusted Canyon, in Pumpkin Palace where a significant stream emerges and flows down into Carotene Canyon, at three springs just downstream from the cave's lower entrance, and in a surface stream just below the end of the marble containing the cave. Somewhat surprisingly several smaller streams, including two in the Schist Canyon part of the cave, did not produce positive results.

Cave Research Foundation in Redwood Canyon: It was another successful summer in lower Redwood Canyon as the Cave Research Foundation (CRF) mounted numerous weekend expeditions. Trips this year continued work on many past projects including survey, hydrologic research, maintenance of the canyon's facilities, and restoration in the cave. Survey work in the cave was done in support of the quadrangle map set that is currently in production. While many of the more than 80 maps have been completed, many more remain to be finished. Coordinating the project and the chief cartographer is Peter Bosted. Other cartographers are Brad Hacker, John Tinsley, Bill Frantz and Joel Despain.

Unfortunately a plan to take two bear boxes into the canyon this year failed due to communication problems concerning their size and weight. We will attempt to get these bear boxes to the research cabin in 1999.

Cave Research Foundation in Mineral King: It was a momentous year for cavers in Mineral King. The 21 acre White Chief property, which contains 12 caves including the longest cave in Mineral King, was acquired by the Park Service. This gave CRF surveyors full access to White Chief Cave. By the end of this fall much of this extensive mazy, multi-level cave had been surveyed. Several years of effort in Cirque Cave were also completed this year by Roger Mortimer, who completed a fine map of this unusual cave. The map documents 1700 feet of passages and rooms including House Cave, the Lake Room and the Mud Room. Overall the cave is "u" shaped. The Mineral King project also extended to the northern end of Mineral King this year with work in Jordan Cave and Empire Mine Cave. Survey work was started but not completed in both caves.

Other Survey and Biology Projects: Survey work also took place this summer in Clough Cave. Though the cave had been mapped in the 60s, the Park lacked the survey data and the map was incomplete. To protect the bats that have been moving back into the cave, the survey was done at night and some of the cavers lights contained a red filter. Bats are less sensitive to red light. Survey work in Carmoe Crevice and Salamander Cave was also completed in 1998. Carmoe is 1,500 feet or 454 meters long and 210 or 64 meters deep. Initial biological inventories were conducted at the same time in both caves.

Paleo-magnetic Dating: Sediment samples were collected on several trips to Crystal, Bear Den, Hurricane, and Clough caves in late summer. The sediments will be analyzed by Dr. Ira Sasowsky from Akron State University. The point of the analysis is to determine the general age of the sediments based upon the orientation of small magnetic particles within the dirt and clay. As you may be aware, the earth's magnetic field wanders and occasionally the magnetic poles switch. At times in the Earth's past the positive end of the Earth was the South Pole, and the negative end the North Pole. When magnetized sediments settle out of water they orient based upon where the positive and negative ends of the earth lie. Sediments are referred to as normal or reversed if the magnetic sediments in them are oriented toward the North Pole or South Pole respectively. The last switch of the Earth's magnetic field was more than 710 thousand years ago. It is very possible, perhaps even likely, that no cave sediments in the Park are that old. In the least, if all of the samples are normally magnetized, we will have established a maximum age for these caves. Results are expected back in the spring.

Park Employee Participation: A concerted effort was made this year to include park research and resource management personnel in caving trips. There are several reasons for this. For one thing, we needed the help. Also by having park employees participate in trips we hoped to gain their appreciation for this significant, but little known part of the park. Park employees helped survey for isopods and millipedes in Crystal Cave and surveyed in Soldier's and Clough caves.

Mining Inventory: A significant effort was undertaken during the summer of 1998 to complete basic inventories of the abandoned mine sites around the Parks. Most of this mining activity took place in 18th Century. Special funding from the Geologic Resources Division helped pay for the work last summer. Mines in Cedar Grove, Redwood Canyon, Mineral King, and along the Middle Fork of the Kings River in the Parks backcountry were all visited. Inventories attempt to assess the mine sites as threats to human safety and as environmental hazards. In general, it was found that Park mines are small, safe and pose no environmental threat. However, a few sites may be reexamined to determine if mitigation of the site might be needed.

1998-1999 Winter Projects

A number of office based projects will be undertaken this winter. It is hoped that we will complete maps of Hurricane Crawl, Carmoe Crevice, Panorama and Clough caves. In addition I hope to complete at least two Lilburn quadrangles in support of Peter Bosted's huge effort to complete the quad set for the cave. The Crystal Cave book will be thoroughly revised this year with an emphasis on a new layout, an update of the Geology and History Chapters, and inclusion of several maps of the cave. Data from the 1998 biological inventories and from mineralogical features documented in Crystal Cave will be entered in a database this winter as preparation for their inclusion in as Arcview GIS coverage of caves and their features. 1998 and 1997 radon exposure calculations for the Crystal Cave staff will be completed in the next month. These records will be kept in the staffs' personnel files. A report on recent dye traces in Hurricane Crawl and Crystal Cave will be completed this winter. As part of the revision of the Park's General Management Plan a position paper in support of cave wilderness within the parks has been completed. In the spring we also hope to complete a web site for the cave management program that will include management plans, photos, past issues of the "Update", visitation information for Crystal Cave, data, and cave maps for viewing and downloading.

Plans for the Summer of 1999

We are again planning a busy summer season for 1999. We hope to have funding to return seasonal Cave Specialist, Greg Stock for ten weeks. We will continue our biological monitoring efforts in several park caves and will expand the efforts to include Hurricane Crawl and Soldier's Caves. Survey work will focus on Soldier's Cave with most work going toward mapping the cave's extensive lower level. A few additional abandoned mining sites remain to be visited in 1999. And we also will continue our usual efforts of supporting CRF's projects and helping the Sequoia Natural History Association appropriately run the commercial operation at Crystal Cave.