PROJECT REPORT

Colorado Bend State Park Project

Project Date: November 7-9, 1997

Reported by: Terry Holsinger (edited by Dale Barnard)

Report Date: November 25, 1997

Person-hours: 252

Personnel: (36 folks) Dale Barnard Jim Kennedy Melonie Alspaugh

James Overfelt Chris Gilbert Chris Murray

Terry Holsinger Tim Stich Jennifer Lemak

Peggy Austin Chris Sobin Jennifer Sobin

Travis Kinchen Chris Vreeland Erin Vreeland

Chris Hall Robert Albach Ed Goff

Laura Goff Rob Jackson Bill Hoffman

Debbie Blackburn Derek Nash Mark Alman

Andrew Alman Sean A Carroll Keith Heuss

Christie Rogers Greg Purcell Nicholas Abercrombie

Eric Abercrombie Don Abercrombie Butch Fralia

Benjamin Heuss Christopher Heuss

The weather treated us wonderfully. We saw a huge turn-out and a bunch of work was accomplished. Project participants showed good persistence in finding their caves and doing as much work as possible. There were five attendees named Chris and one Christie, leading to much confusion, a new cave name (Chris-Squared Cave), and many bad jokes at times. This is probably some type of Colorado Bend record.

The team of Dale Barnard, Jim Kennedy, Melonie Alspaugh, James Overfelt, Chris Gilbert, and Chris Murray all headed over to the Lost Petzl System (the area around Chimnier's Delight) to "straighten out the tags, and surface survey between the entrances". They located the 2-entrance cave that lacked a tag, but had a danger sign. It is towards the lower part of the system. Then, they walked up the drainage and found Chimnier's Delight, which is correctly tagged as SAB206. Continuing up to the wrongly-tagged SAB239 feature (this number belongs to Centennial Cave), they removed the tag and put the new SAB280 on it. Dale nearly fit in it, but they will wait until they can get more tools. Terry says that this connects to Golden State Motor Oil Can Cave, but the connection is not indicated on the map. They then went up about 30 meters to Many Names Cave, which is correctly tagged as SAB227. This tag was to be the system base station, but Jim's old clinometer was sticking. They canceled the overland survey for the day. Instead, they walked up the hill from Many Names Caves to where Chris and Chris had found a new cave. Melonie and Dale did a quick survey from the new tag SAB281, but Dale could not squeeze into the drop. It was named Chris-Squared Cave. It had an old flashlight in it, which Dale accidentally kicked down the hole. Meanwhile, Jim Kennedy dug open Little Red Cave, now tagged as SAB282 on the hackberry tree next to it. It goes down about 20' and over 15' and currently ends in a dirt dig. It needs to be surveyed. It is only about 10' from SAB281. Jim used his "Little Red" eight-pound sledgehammer to open it up and then opened up another cave just up the hill. What a day! After exiting Chris-Squared, Dale went to Jim's new find and squeezed into it. It was a typical narrow crevice that seemed to have no floor until Dale descended about 70 or 80'. Fantastic! Dale invited someone to follow and Melonie came in. Reaching the bottom, Dale continued horizontally, ascending a bit and crawling at floor level until he rounded the last passable bend. To his surprise, there was the flashlight that he had accidentally kicked into the pit in Chris-squared. Now we know that they connect, although a survey connection

would be impossible without breaking rock. Dale proposed the name Floorless Crevice, but Jim got to name it BAC (Big Ass Cave) since he found it. It should get a new number since there is no passable connection to Chris-Squared Cave. Terry joined us at 3:00 after solving his vehicle problems. Total teams hours = 35

The team of Tim Stich, Jennifer Lemak, and Peggy Austin headed out to the Lively Pasture to locate and survey SAB180 Skunk Hole. Tim had been unable to find this cave on earlier trip. At the windmill they followed the power line a short distance then went to SAB181, Parsley Pit. They entered to get more information to finish the map of this cave. They then located SAB180 a short distance further down the power lines. They found the SAB tag on the ground, so they placed it in a large tree knot. After sketching the surface features around the entrance, they made a sketch map of the cave, which is about a 25' "drop," which ends in dirt fill. One return trip to make a couple of survey shots should finish the map. The cave description should be updated/completed at this time.

Total teams hours = 11

The team of Chris Sobin, Jennifer Sobin, Travis Kinchen, Chris Vreeland, and Erin Vreeland went to SAB232 Lone Bat II. They rigged the drop and entered, checking for Bad Air. None was found so they proceeded to re-map the cave. They finished the survey and will start drafting the map. This was Erin Vreeland's first in-cave rappel and on-rope exit.

Total teams hours = 30

The team of Chris Hall, Robert Albach, Ed Goff, and Laura Goff went to survey SAB231 PG Pit. They had "fun" (as usual) locating a cave they had never been to. Summary: A good learning experience for all involved on a small, typical Colorado Bend fissure cave. The description was of a tight cave needing vertical equipment and 30-50 feet or rope. They were given detailed instructions regarding the cave's location relative to trail and surrounding geologic features. However, incorrect details about trail head had been given. After driving all the way down to the river, they returned and finally selected the parking lot on east side of road, just south of TSA camp. Ed and his wife started down the trail while Robert and Chris went back to get forgotten pencils (how embarrassing!). At camp, they got new instructions as to the trailhead parking. At 12:45pm, they finally got to the correct trailhead. They headed off on the Jeep track opposite the parking lot. Realizing that they were heading in the wrong direction, they bushwhacked north briefly until they found the Gorman Cave trail. Once on the trail, the cave was easily found. It is located about 10-12' to the south of the eastbound trail about 50 feet from the lip of a 10 foot creek drop-off. The entrance is obscured by two 2' high boulders between the trail and canyon walls. They rigged a tensionless knot around a large boulder above the entrance on the canyon wall slope. The entrance is very constricted with one of the obscuring boulders overhanging the entry. The rope bag and rope was dropped onto a visible ledge directly below entrance. They all rigged up with vertical gear, but ended up having to remove much in order to enter the entrance. Ed Goff was the first person in and confirmed that rope and gear were not necessary. The second person in, Chris Hall, dismissed need for any vertical gear at all. Robert Albach did the drawings and recorded the data, his first time at that end of the pencil. Chris Hall read the instruments, which was his first time. Ed Goff selected stations and held the "dumb" end of tape. Ten stations in all were needed to describe the cave. Several stations were "re-shot" by Ed Goff to gain some experience with the instruments. Stations 9 and 10 were postponed by Albach due to positioning and some bad air. Due to the bad air, a lower crawl to the bottom of the pit was not fully mapped, which would have closed the loop from the upper passage to the bottom of the pit. The cave is a typical tight fissure cave common to the area. It has sharply scalloped sides

with occasional chert. The cave is "inactive" as no living speleothems were noted. Mostly, it is chimneying and crawling within three levels. The levels are separated by combinations of solid and loose rock. Multiple plant roots are in the cave, some finger thick and others hair-like. Entrance area had snails (unidentified), daddy long legs, and cave crickets. Cave crickets were common throughout cave. The dirt around station 4 was teeming with small white aphid-like creatures. A small half-inch millipede was also found here. There was no sign of bat habitation.

They noted that bad air was found at 3:30pm, 4' above station 10, which was the bottom of the cave. The cave bottom was loose, damp dirt. Given the proximity of the cave to the Gorman Cave trail this may be a cave that the public could use. The formations are not active and there was very little wildlife to hurt. Drawbacks to this idea are as follows: Top-level rock would have to be moved to ease entry (a good come-along should do it easily), and it would probably not be comfortable to have more than 5 people in at a time. We believe that the PG in PG Pit should stand for "Pretty Gimpy" given the gap between the original description and reality.

After finishing the survey, they explored the dry creek (NoN…Me creek) looking for more features, but found none. They hiked back to truck by moonlight. What a day!

Total teams hours = 28

The team of Rob Jackson and Bill Hoffman went to Cicurina Cave to get some water samples from the sump and to try to locate the sump on the surface by the presence of large water-hungry trees on the surface. They noticed a few bats, probably Pips. Rob is doing a botany project dealing with how trees get and use water. Water samples will also help with Christie Rogers' thesis work in the spring area (we hope).

Total teams hours = 10

The team of Debbie Blackburn, Derek Nash, Mark Alman, and Andrew Alman was led out to SAB185, Ricotta Razor Rift, by Jim Kennedy where he showed them some of the other caves near by. They then surveyed most of the cave. There was not any noticeable bad air. However, after about 20 minutes at the bottom, they all had headaches. Leaving a couple of unsurveyed leads, they headed out where Mark needed some assistance to exit the entrance because he "had no leverage". They then headed over to Ice Box to check out the air quality for Andrew's planned cleanup project. The air was better then it had been and about 5 pounds of small trash was removed from the entrance area. A date for the cleanup may be set sometime after the first of the year.

Total teams hours = 26

The team of Sean A Carroll, Christie Rogers, and Greg Purcell was off to Lower Gorman Creek, above the springs. They were helping Christie Rogers to "map" the structural features in the creek bed that may be related to why the spring is where it is.

Total teams hours = 24

The team of Don Abercrombie, Eric Abercrombie, Nicholas Abercrombie, Butch Fralia, Benjamin Heuss, Christopher Heuss, and Keith Heuss continued with their GPS work as outlined below:

This trip was supposed to be the trial-by-fire of Butch's new Digital GPS (DGPS) system. Arriving with the usual collection of GPS receivers was a shiny new DCI-3000 DGPS system with 10-meter service. The DCI-3000 receiver receives differential correction information to correct for the induced error of selective availability of the GPS satellites. The information is transmitted via the pager frequencies of FM broadcast stations. The nearest providing FM station for DCI is located

in Waco. The DCI system was selected because it has the lowest cost of any currently available commercial DGPS provider, and thus the lowest risk. The cost of the receiver is $350.00 and ten-meter service is $75.00 annually. In June of 1997, Butch and Keith experimented with an AccqPoint one-meter service using a DGPS receiver that they had rented for the weekend from Miller Blue Print in Austin. The unit, when it would lock on to a service provider's signal, was very accurate. Measurements could be repeated within two meters. It could not however be made to work at all locations on the park. The cost of the AccqPoint receiver is $475.00 and the service is $900.00 annually. With the demonstrated lack of reliability, it was deemed too high a risk for a poor volunteer's pocketbook. The effort started on Saturday morning when Butch fired up the receiver to see if it would lock onto the service provider. At the camp site, it was somewhat flaky but did achieve a lock. Keith used his digital volt meter to check the batteries and found they were on the margin of putting out enough voltage to keep the receiver operational. Butch and Keith went into the Bend Store and bought three new batteries. That provided enough voltage but the receiver would no longer lock reliably. This was not starting out to be a good DGPS day!

Butch, Ben, Chris, Don, Eric and Nicholas started out at 10:00 am headed for the Gorman Fissure System to try the system out and hopefully get more accurate UTM coordinates for the caves and Karst features there. On the way, they stopped by the elevation benchmark and found that they could get a sufficient lock for a location measurement. The measurement compared within two meters of the measurements taken with the AccqPoint unit in June. At the Fissure System, they could not get the DGPS system to lock at all. While there, Don, Erick and Nicholas entered several of the fissures to verify the description or obtain one as well as to determine if there was any associated passage. They visited SAB134, SAB275, SAB277 and SAB279. This data will be presented below. During the time that Don, Erick and Nicholas were in the cave, Butch took a 30 minute averaged GPS reading. After Gorman Fissure, the group returned to camp for a short break and then went back out. They returned to the bench mark location and again got a DGPS lock and got comparable readings to the readings earlier in the day. They proceeded into Lively Pasture since it's at one of the higher elevations in the park and tried the DGPS at Space Heater Cave. It also chose not to work there. Moving on to Gorman Creek Crevice, the DGPS didn't work, but Butch took a 30 minute averaged GPS reading. They moved on to Horseshoe Chimney and took another 30 minute averaged GPS reading. That ended the work day and they returned to camp about 6:30 p.m.

The plans for the DGPS are to return in December with an improved battery system and hopefully better antenna system. If possible to locate suitable candidates, several antennas may be tried along with an antenna preamplifier. On the way home, closer to Waco, the DGPS receiver locked on to the provider signal without a glitch. The station can be picked up on a truck radio with a good stereo lock (one of the pre-requisites). The possibilities are there—it's just a matter of putting the combinations together. If DGPS can be made to work at CBSP, the plan is to get new location data on every cave and Karst feature on the park. Most work at CBSP is referenced to USGS topographic maps. USGS rates these maps to only twenty meter accuracy.

Total teams hours = 56

SAB134 Dagger Cave

The cave entrance is an elongated fissure approximately 30' long trending 220 degrees. There is about 35' of horizontal passage at the bottom. There are chimney passages going up that Erick was able to climb up, but couldn't fit into the horizontal passage at the top. The map in the Caves of San Saba County adequately represents the cave. The entrance is climbable but a safety belay should be used as it can get sporting in a couple of places, especially for short legged people.

SAB275 Angel Fissure

This fissure barely qualifies as a cave using the present criteria of 15 meters. The entrance is a fissure trending at 220 degrees with two intersecting fissures branching off at 180 degrees and 130 degrees. The main fissure is 100' long while the 180 degree fissure is 20' and the 130 degree fissure is 40'. The depth from surface to the floor is 24' (measured) and covered passage is 18' north to south and 8' east to west.

SAB277 Three Entrance Fissure

Three Entrance Fissure trends at 140 degrees into the side of a slight rise. Falling rocks have formed a talus roof over several parts of the fissure leaving three entrances. The depth of the fissure begins about 6' from the surface and slopes slightly downward into the side of the hill. The length is 40' ending in a low passage less than 6".

SAB279 Angel Fissure.

Angel Fissure is a 20' long fissure trending at 220 degrees. There is a 15' intersecting fissure branching off at 125 degrees. At the floor, the fissure is about 20' long, widening at the north end.

On Sunday, Jim and Chris Vreeland, Christie Rogers, Chris Hall, Sean Carroll, and one or two others (sorry I didn't write the names down), did a lot more surface work. First they went to the two karst features right along the old road to Gorman Spring. A quick bit of hammer work opened up the 8" hole to the first feature, which went into a small fissure that did not continue. It is therefore not a legal cave. The other feature was checked out, with no continuation, but it might be long enough to warrant a name.

Then, they went over to Vreeland's dig across the road from Sweet Cave. The rattlesnake was still there, so little new digging was accomplished. Jim showed Christie the Sweet/Sour/Bitter System so she could get an appreciation for fissure karst and take some joint measurements. Finally, the group headed over to the Lost Petzl System for some real fissure karst. Jim and Chris Vreeland dug into yet another cave near Little Red that looks like it drops about 60-70 feet and needs vertical gear. It is so-far unnamed and will be mapped in December. This area will see a lot of effort over the next few trips as there are a lot of caves in a small area, they all have good air, and many should connect to each other. It would be a good recreational caving area for a permit style access system.

Teams total hours = 32.0