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Oct. 16 2004
 

Carroll Cave Conservancy

Trip Report

Permit number:

Trip leaders name: Colby Johnson

Date of trip: 10/16/2004

Project manager: Mike Hartley

Purpose of trip: Restoration assessments in Carroll river passage and paradise passage

Area of cave visited: Carroll River

Participants:

1.      trip leader, Colby Johnson

1.      Mike Hartley

1.      Jamie Euliss

1.      john Ryder

1.      Ben McCall

Well we all started out at the school house around 8:30 am waiting for everybody on the sign up sheet to show up or get word that they were not going to make it. About an hour went by then mike started to make phone calls to the rest of the people that we haven’t heard from already. So things were looking like it was going to be just the five of us that going to go in the cave so we all started up the hill and suited up. Everybody got signed in and down the hole at 12:15 pm. It took us a little longer than usual because this was Ben’s first time in Carroll so I instructed him on his descent of the ladder. Once we started out we all hot foot it to make up some of the time that we lost in the morning. We made it through the water barrier in no time then we slowed the pace because none of us have been farther than the water barrier in Carroll passage. So really all we knew about the entrance to paradise passage that it was 1200-1500 feet past the lunch room on the right hand side from the water barrier. So we came too the first major right hand side passage and followed it back about 500 feet and came up on a flat lime stone pool with a small water fall trickling into it from up above. It was neat but we were still kind of unsure that we were in the right side passage so we continued on in this side passage. We came to a nice little crawl spot so I continued through the crawl to see what it looked like on the other side of the crawl space. I really didn’t see a big traffic way at all so I went back through the crawl and talk to the guys about where we were. In the mean time Mike and Ben were getting some good pictures of the lime stone pool I mentioned. So as Mike and Ben Came up with some good pictures Jamie, John, and myself decided to head down Carroll passage a little farther. The three of us made it about another1500 feet looking at two more side passages on the right and still weren’t for sure about them so we took a little break and then started back to meet up with Mike and Ben to make it out of the cave at 8:00 pm for the Halloween dinner. We were all pretty tired from the dreaded Carroll cave mud so each of us took our own pace back to the ladder. Jamie and I lead and Mike brought up the rear. We all made it back to the ladder right at 7:45 pm; everybody made it up the ladder and was out of the cave at

8:20 pm.

During the trip as we passed through the water barrier we counted 160+ bats of any species. We came across a small cluster, roughly 40-50 bats there. Once we saw the cluster, we tried not to disturb them. We also saw one fish. There were quite a few empty cans glass bottles and trash that has been there for a long time. I would suggest a clean up run in the future. Other than that I was impressed with how the cave was hardly damage in the highly concentrated areas of formations in Carroll passage.

We also found a yellow survey tape real if anybody is missing one. It’s sitting in the silo waiting for its owner.