January 1st |
Max White and Jon Beard | Max White and Jon Beard hunted for Greene County karst features as part of SPG's Greene County Project. They first checked Erie Sink and associated sinks to the west. They then visited the entrance to Rountree Spring Cave, obtaining a GPS reading, entrance measurements and photos, before determining a route to Skeleton and Wilson Creek caves (with plans for a visit at a later date). Finally, Max and Jon checked Welch Spring Cave and Piracy Cave, obtaining entrance data for these features. Welch Spring Cave is a new addition to the database. |
| January 2nd | Eric Hertzler and Jon Beard | Eric Hertzler and Jon Beard spent the day checking Greene County caves and obtaining entrance information. They found Half-a-Hill Piracy Cave, but as its entrance is too small to enter (three inches high) and is almost immediately sumped, it has since been deleted from the caves database (but retained as a karst feature). They then saw the entrance to Hog Cave #1, which also appears to be too small to enter (five inches high). Hog Cave #2, a previously undocumented cave, is a low watercrawl, but enterable. They next saw Road Cave, a short wet cave, followed by a visit to Jones Spring Cave and nearby Cox Cave, a dry cave. The last two caves they checked were Bonebrake Spring Cave, another small wet cave, and the now filled entrance of Roberts Cemetery Cave. All that is left of the latter entrance is a dirt and gravel-floored oblong sink with no opening. |
| January 10th | Jon Beard and Roy Gold | Jon Beard and Roy Gold continued work on the Greene County Project on a day beginning at minus 7 degrees F. They first visited the former entrance to Cherry Street Cave, now a filled sink with a minor throat. After this they found Nixon Cave, for years without a location in the database despite there being an old cave map. They then checked Mill Street Cave, a cave with a picturesque natural arch and a collapsing north wall to the cave, now a series of skylights and a revised appearance since the 1971 map was made. Nearby is Country Club Cave, which was mapped for about 600 feet a few decades ago, also has one of the widest entrances in the county (58 feet). On this cold day it had spectacular icicles (tites and mites) throughout the entrance area. Last on the agenda were Sequiota Cave and a potential new entry to the cave files, Sequiota Spring Cave, a cave with a small wet entrance that will be checked in warmer weather. |
| January 11th | Charley Young | Charley Young took several photos of impressive ice formations in the entrance area of Lowell Cave (Wright Co), one of which was featured (without cave name or location) on a local TV news weather report. |
| January 16th | Tom Morton, Kirby Tiller and Jon Beard | Tom Morton, Kirby Tiller and Jon Beard continued work on Greene County cave entrances, obtaining photos, GPS locations and entrance dimensions for Crighton Natural Bridge, Crighton Natural Bridge Spring Cave, May Pit (now filled), May Cave and Devils Slide Cave. May Cave was thoroughly explored and photographed, but contains an inaccessible active stream. Except for the May caves, the caves visited this day have been recently resurveyed by teams led by Eric Hertzler and Bob Taylor. |
| January 16th | Doug Gouzie | Doug Gouzie and two of his students checked out a cave near Ozark in Christian County. The climbable vertical entrance led to 70-80 feet of joint controlled and sinuous passage and a calf-deep pool. Beyond this the cave became bedding plane controlled and too small to continue. |
| January 17th | Dave Ashley, Jon Beard, Zach Copeland, Brian Goeppner and Eric Hertzler |
Dave Ashley, Jon Beard, Zach Copeland, Brian Goeppner and Eric Hertzler were among a group (also consisting of John Durham, Josh Evan, Bill Gee and Mike Vost) taking a biology trip to Carroll Cave (Camden Co). They split into two groups to document biology while placing terra cotta tiles and bait sticks. The group of Zach, Dave, Bill and Mike did their work in Upper Thunder River while the other team did the same in Lower Thunder River. The two teams noted a total of a few dozen southern cavefish. |
| January 24th | Jon Beard, Roy Gold, George Lantz, Nancy Nycum, Jared Ozee, Robert Ozee, Maria Thompson, Todd Twilbeck, Max White and Charley Young |
Jon Beard, Roy Gold, George Lantz, Nancy Nycum, Jared Ozee, Robert Ozee, Maria Thompson, Todd Twilbeck, Max White and Charley Young conducted a bat inventory in Breakdown and Fitzpatrick caves (Christian Co) in what is hoped to be an annual count. They counted 101 tricolored bats in the northern half of Breakdown Cave, 24 tricolored and one big brown bat in Fitzpatrick's lower level. They saw troglobitic spiders and millipedes as well as profuse crickets and heliomyzid flies. Some bad news is that, as expected, the February and March 2008 floods apparently drowned a number of bats in the cave. The good news is that this number was not nearly as many as first feared. Typically 150 hibernators were counted in the past, so the population was reduced by only 33 percent. No bats were seen in the lowermost levels of Breakdown, which typically contained several hibernators in the past. Other than this bat count, Breakdown Cave remains closed for the winter. |
| January 27th | Jon Beard | Jon Beard obtained a GPS reading, entrance dimensions and a photo of the Gravelle Pit Cave entrance in Greene Co. Mapped by Jon et al in 1990, the entrance is fenced and bermed to prevent neighborhood dogs and parking lot runoff from entering. The pit complex is 76 feet deep, second in Greene County to Sabre Karren Cave's 82-foot depth. Gravelle Pit contains 503 feet of mapped passage, none of it further than 60 feet horizontally from the entrance shafts. The cave contains five waterfalls, a significant pool and past evidence of significant bat usage. |
| January 31st | Jon Beard, Roy Gold, George Lantz and Todd Twilbeck |
Jon Beard, Roy Gold, George Lantz and his father-in law and Todd Twilbeck checked out and documented a number of Greene County caves. First, they obtained entrance data on the three entrances to Watkins Cave, one of which was sealed shut with concrete several years ago. After this they made a brief unsuccessful search for Darrel Cave, shown in the database as being only 600 feet north of Watkins. Either Darrel is filled, incorrectly located or is yet another pseudonym for Watkins, which already has three other secondary names. After this, they visited with the landowners of Ash Grove Cave and Scott Spring Cave, the latter accompanying the group to the entrance of Scott Spring. This cave is being targeted for mapping in warmer weather. After collecting data, the group drove to the Johnson Cave area in search of a badly mislocated cave. They eventually found the landowner to Johnson Cave, located the cave, and took measurements. The cave was mapped way back in 1983 to about 80 feet but might be pushed further. The last cave of the day was Line Box Cave, a short dry cave. |