[Texascavers] Book Review: Aquanaut

[William R. Elliott]

*Book Review: **Aquanaut*

*The Inside Story of the Thai Cave Rescue: A Life Beneath the Surface *

By Rick Stanton with Karen Dealy, 2021

Michael Joseph/Penguin, Random House, UK

$22.49 hardback, $18.95 paperback, at Amazon.com and other bookstores



Cavers should read this exciting book about the rescue of 13 stranded
soccer kids from the flooded Tham Luong cave, Thailand. *Rick Stanton *served
for years as a firefighter, but cave diving was his passion. He is one of
the top cave divers in the world, known for his careful, but daring
explorations of the tough, deep caves of the UK and Europe. He was an
outstanding rescuer, both at work and in caves. He was retired for four
years when he got a call in 2018, asking him and others to come to
Thailand.



The book is a review of Rick’s major dives through the years, interwoven
with a detailed account of the Thai rescue. In a way his whole diving
career was preparation for the most daunting cave diving rescue ever. The
alternative, advocated by some officials, was to let them live in a
threatening environment for months, which probably would have killed them
all. Their team brought the children out one at a time by sedating them
with ketamine, administered by hero-diver Dr. Richard Harris and the
divers. Each diver swam a single child out, each child wearing a full-face
respirator and breathing 75% oxygen. The exit was highly choreographed,
with segments of dry cave utilizing stretchers and pre-arranged divers. No
one had ever given ketamine to cave victims before, and it worked!



Even if you don’t like cave diving, you will like this book!!



*Bill Elliott, 20 July 2022*
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[Texascavers] book review: Cuba

[Mixon Bill via Texascavers]

Cuevas de Sancti Spiritus, Matanzas y Pinar del Rio, Cuba / Caves of Sancti 
Spiritus, Matanzas and Pinar del Rio, Cuba.Edited by Joel Despain. Caliza 
Media, Bella Vista, California, 2016. A4 (8.27 by 11.69 inches). PDF file from 
www.calizamedia.net/products. Full version 323 pages, about 100 MB, $15. Short 
version 126 pages, $7.

Prepared by the Sama Caving Group of the Cuban Speleological Society, the 
Antonio Núñez Jiménez Foundation for Man and Nature, and the Project for Cuban 
Cave Studies of the National Speleological Society, this bilingual report is an 
important and impressive production. A paper version is foreseen, but not yet 
available.

Following introductions in English and Spanish, including conservation and 
safety messages, Part 1 contains reports on caving expeditions to Cuba, mostly 
reprinted from articles that appeared in the NSS News and only one in both 
Spanish and English. I have not seen the short version, but these parts, 
through page 115, appear to be its content. Part 2 contains technical articles 
on cave biology, seven in Spanish only and four bilingual. Part 3 covers 
geology and paleontology, with three articles each in English and bilingual and 
a number of cave maps. Part 4 contains eleven detailed maps on oversize sheets 
of caves surveyed by the project.

The text could have used a good editing, and the layout, while well designed, 
was somewhat carelessly done. The main problem with the PDF is that each page 
of the file contains both halves of a two-page spread in the book, a terrible 
idea that not only makes it impossible to ask a PDF reader to jump to a page by 
its number in the book, but also leads to more zooming and scrolling than 
should have been necessary when reading it, even on a large computer monitor.

That said, the zooming and scrolling are worth it because of the photographs 
throughout the book. The full version is advertised as having 159 large photos, 
and I count 91 of them printed full-page without margins. A huge plus are the 
92 photos by Kevin Downey, who has been one of the best American cave 
photographers for many years but whose work hardly ever appears in print. Get 
the full version just for that.—Bill Mixon

God created the world in six days.
On the seventh day, while God rested,
the Devil created religion.

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Re: [Texascavers] book review: Twelve Miles from Daylight

[Stefan Creaser via Texascavers]

If anyone wants one then perhaps Crash can get them with a bulk discount at 
'Convention?

-Stefan

-Original Message-
From: Texascavers [mailto:texascavers-boun...@texascavers.com] On Behalf Of Jim 
Kennedy via Texascavers
Sent: Wednesday, June 21, 2017 2:18 PM
To: texascavers@texascavers.com
Cc: Jim Kennedy <cavercr...@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [Texascavers] book review: Twelve Miles from Daylight

They are available from the authors here at the NSS Convention for only $44.95. 
I bought mine on Mindy.

Jim

Mobile email from my iPhone

> On Jun 21, 2017, at 11:36 AM, Mixon Bill via Texascavers 
> <texascavers@texascavers.com> wrote:
>
> "Twelve Miles from Daylight: Fort Stanton Cave and the Snowy River 
> Discovery." Edited by Pete Lindsley and Lee Skinner. Fort Stanton Cave Study 
> Project, Placitas, New Mexico. ISBN 978-0-939748-83-9. 9 by 12 inches, 
> softbound, vi+306 pages+foldout. $54.95.
>

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Re: [Texascavers] book review: Twelve Miles from Daylight

[Jim Kennedy via Texascavers]

They are available from the authors here at the NSS Convention for only $44.95. 
I bought mine on Mindy. 

Jim

Mobile email from my iPhone

> On Jun 21, 2017, at 11:36 AM, Mixon Bill via Texascavers 
>  wrote:
> 
> "Twelve Miles from Daylight: Fort Stanton Cave and the Snowy River 
> Discovery." Edited by Pete Lindsley and Lee Skinner. Fort Stanton Cave Study 
> Project, Placitas, New Mexico. ISBN 978-0-939748-83-9. 9 by 12 inches, 
> softbound, vi+306 pages+foldout. $54.95.
> 
> For too many years, Fort Stanton Cave has been in the shadow of New Mexico’s 
> Lechuguilla Cave, the subject of several books, one published in three 
> languages and one a trilogy of e-books. This new large-format book should go 
> far to redress that. Since the 1950s, organized cavers have extended the cave 
> to over thirty-one miles of passage, including the amazing Snowy River 
> Passage that runs eleven miles north-south and gives the overall line-plot on 
> a topo map an extent that appears to dwarf famous caves that are in fact 
> longer. There are color photographs on most pages, including over thirty 
> full-page ones. Simple maps of parts of the cave clarify the geography. While 
> there is a lot of other information, the bulk of the text consists of trip 
> reports by a large number of authors, which should enhance its appeal to 
> cavers.
> 
> There have been significant delays in exploration caused by a persnickety 
> owner for such things as environmental assessments, but overall the BLM seems 
> to have been reasonably accommodating. In the early years, efforts focussed 
> on long and arduous digs in the old part of the cave that resulted in its 
> considerable expansion. Things changed dramatically on September 1, 2001, 
> when a dig led to the discovery of the Snowy River Passage, largely walking 
> and in places providing plenty of obvious good leads. The passage gets its 
> name from the layer of white calcite that coats the floor of the stream bed 
> for its entire length. The passage proved not all that easy to follow. To 
> avoid soiling the Snowy River, parties had to change from dirty to clean 
> clothes every time they had been forced to walk on mud banks or breakdown by 
> some obstruction, and eventually even small, fast parties of young and fit 
> cavers were making “day trips” over thirty hours long; sometimes they 
> returned with over a mile of new survey. The project was eventually given 
> permission to establish a campsite near the far end of exploration, but it 
> has been used only twice.
> 
> Perhaps the most impressive single accomplishment in the book is the digging 
> and shoring of a new and safer access shaft to the Snowy River. This is over 
> forty feet deep, and 222 cavers are credited in an appendix with helping in 
> the effort.
> 
> The several people credited with checking and proofreading have done a good 
> job, and the text is clear and mostly free of errors. The layout is garish 
> and ignores some common standards. The reader will have to dodge the numerous 
> and often lengthy sidebars in some of the early chapters, but later chapters 
> are better organized. Don’t ignore the sidebars, though. They contain a lot 
> of historical information, impressions and reports by many cavers, and 
> science notes. The most important event in the entire book, the discovery of 
> the Snowy River Passage, is buried in a sidebar at the end of chapter 6. The 
> photographs are well selected and well prepared, although I wonder whether 
> some of the colors are not exaggerated. Appendices include a glossary and an 
> index that is thorough but lists people by their first names.
> 
> As this is written, based on a final PDF of the book provided by Pete 
> Lindsley, the cave has been closed by the BLM because of white-nose syndrome, 
> and anyway travel in the Snowy River passage has been forbidden for the past 
> couple of years because the steam is flowing and it is feared that the 
> calcite floor will be too delicate when wet. It is not yet clear how much of 
> the time the stream flows; this is not the first time that has been seen. The 
> government also doesn’t want cavers to push beyond its property lines. I kind 
> of hope they have and are just not talking about it. In any case, we’re sure 
> to eventually hear a lot more about this spectacular cave. Meanwhile, buy 
> this book.
> --Bill Mixon
> 
> Nature is a hanging judge.
> 
> You may "reply" to the address this message
> (unless it's a TexasCavers list post)
> came from, but for long-term use, save:
> Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
> AMCS: a...@mexicancaves.org or sa...@mexicancaves.org
> 
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> 

[Texascavers] book review: Twelve Miles from Daylight

[Mixon Bill via Texascavers]

"Twelve Miles from Daylight: Fort Stanton Cave and the Snowy River Discovery." 
Edited by Pete Lindsley and Lee Skinner. Fort Stanton Cave Study Project, 
Placitas, New Mexico. ISBN 978-0-939748-83-9. 9 by 12 inches, softbound, vi+306 
pages+foldout. $54.95.

For too many years, Fort Stanton Cave has been in the shadow of New Mexico’s 
Lechuguilla Cave, the subject of several books, one published in three 
languages and one a trilogy of e-books. This new large-format book should go 
far to redress that. Since the 1950s, organized cavers have extended the cave 
to over thirty-one miles of passage, including the amazing Snowy River Passage 
that runs eleven miles north-south and gives the overall line-plot on a topo 
map an extent that appears to dwarf famous caves that are in fact longer. There 
are color photographs on most pages, including over thirty full-page ones. 
Simple maps of parts of the cave clarify the geography. While there is a lot of 
other information, the bulk of the text consists of trip reports by a large 
number of authors, which should enhance its appeal to cavers.

There have been significant delays in exploration caused by a persnickety owner 
for such things as environmental assessments, but overall the BLM seems to have 
been reasonably accommodating. In the early years, efforts focussed on long and 
arduous digs in the old part of the cave that resulted in its considerable 
expansion. Things changed dramatically on September 1, 2001, when a dig led to 
the discovery of the Snowy River Passage, largely walking and in places 
providing plenty of obvious good leads. The passage gets its name from the 
layer of white calcite that coats the floor of the stream bed for its entire 
length. The passage proved not all that easy to follow. To avoid soiling the 
Snowy River, parties had to change from dirty to clean clothes every time they 
had been forced to walk on mud banks or breakdown by some obstruction, and 
eventually even small, fast parties of young and fit cavers were making “day 
trips” over thirty hours long; sometimes they returned with over a mile of new 
survey. The project was eventually given permission to establish a campsite 
near the far end of exploration, but it has been used only twice.

Perhaps the most impressive single accomplishment in the book is the digging 
and shoring of a new and safer access shaft to the Snowy River. This is over 
forty feet deep, and 222 cavers are credited in an appendix with helping in the 
effort.

The several people credited with checking and proofreading have done a good 
job, and the text is clear and mostly free of errors. The layout is garish and 
ignores some common standards. The reader will have to dodge the numerous and 
often lengthy sidebars in some of the early chapters, but later chapters are 
better organized. Don’t ignore the sidebars, though. They contain a lot of 
historical information, impressions and reports by many cavers, and science 
notes. The most important event in the entire book, the discovery of the Snowy 
River Passage, is buried in a sidebar at the end of chapter 6. The photographs 
are well selected and well prepared, although I wonder whether some of the 
colors are not exaggerated. Appendices include a glossary and an index that is 
thorough but lists people by their first names.

As this is written, based on a final PDF of the book provided by Pete Lindsley, 
the cave has been closed by the BLM because of white-nose syndrome, and anyway 
travel in the Snowy River passage has been forbidden for the past couple of 
years because the steam is flowing and it is feared that the calcite floor will 
be too delicate when wet. It is not yet clear how much of the time the stream 
flows; this is not the first time that has been seen. The government also 
doesn’t want cavers to push beyond its property lines. I kind of hope they have 
and are just not talking about it. In any case, we’re sure to eventually hear a 
lot more about this spectacular cave. Meanwhile, buy this book.
--Bill Mixon

Nature is a hanging judge.

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[Texascavers] book review: Underground Ranger

[Mixon Bill via Texascavers]

This book was heavily promoted at the NSS convention in July. Official 
publication date isn't until the middle of next month, strangely.

"Underground Ranger: Adventures in Carlsbad Caverns National Park and Other 
Remarkable Places." Doug Thompson. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, 
2016. ISBN 978-0-8263-5750-2. 6 by 9 inches, 257 pages, paperback. $24.95.

Following some years of experience working for the NPS elsewhere, Doug Thompson 
applied for and got a job as an interpretive ranger at Carlsbad Caverns 
National Park despite having never been in a cave. The first half of this book 
describes how he learned about the caves, overcame fears of places like crawly 
Spider Cave where wild-cave trips are conducted, and prepared his spiels for 
Carlsbad Cavern tours. Following some black-and-white photos pointlessly 
segregated into a few pages, the second half of the book contains descriptions 
and lore about the Guads and the Chihuahuan Desert interleaved with 
descriptions of various caving trips, including ones to Ellison's Cave in 
Georgia and Lechuguilla in the park.

In some ways the writing seems juvenile. Except in the acknowledgements, 
Thompson refers to all his friends and coworkers by only their first names, and 
the depths of pits are given in stories, as in buildings. But he was clearly 
the most bookish and philosophically inclined among the rangers, and it shows. 
The writing is exceptionally good and clear; I only mentally grasped a red 
pencil twice in the whole book—comprise for compose. Explanations of geology 
and cave science are clear, if not too elaborate, and safety and conservation 
messages are conspicuous.

An entertaining read.—Bill Mixon

A chicken is the egg's way of making another egg.

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Re: [Texascavers] book review: Caving Basics

[Charles Loving via Texascavers]

Caving basics:
Back in the last year of 1960's I got into caving. Clark Santos took me to
a caver party. The cavers were allied with the Rangeroos at the time. A keg
of beer and a band playing cool music was a great way to recruit. The next
thing was a trip to Bustamante. A GI surplus canteen belt and canteen and a
side pack from Academy. A hard hat from a place that sold welding supplies
and a carbide light and baby bottle full of carbide from Jim Strickland. Oh
yes, and some combat boots.

Bustamante didn't need rope so we drove to Nuevo Laredo went bar hopping,
slept on the side of the road and turned right at Sabinas Hidalgo right
before the bridge and then turned right behind the movie house and rolled
to Villadama and down a dirt road to Bustamante. Got lost driving around on
goat trails and finally found the canyon. Got out and carried a case of
Carta Blanca and ourselves up the 57 switch backs or however many there
were. Ran into Ed Alexander, Super Bounce and another group of caver types.
The first cave trip.

On Sat, Aug 13, 2016 at 12:09 PM, Mixon Bill via Texascavers <
texascavers@texascavers.com> wrote:

> "Caving Basics: A Comprehensive Guide for Beginning Cavers," fourth
> edition. Edited by Dean Wiseman and Curt Harler. National Speleological
> Society, 2016. ISBN 978-1-68044-007-7. 8.5 by 11 inches, 271 pages,
> softbound. $25 (NSS members $22.50, life members $20).
>
> This book updates, sometimes not enough, the third edition that was
> published almost twenty-five years ago. The overall design is similar, with
> major sections on equipment, techniques, and cave science. The main
> revolution in equipment over that period, at least for a beginner with no
> need for battery-powered hammer drills, has been LED lighting, and the
> all-new chapter on lights covers those, but mainly relatively expensive
> types that are perhaps overkill for the intended reader. Are there no
> batteries smaller than AA? The chapter on caving clothes is new; most other
> parts of this section are just warmed over. The chapter on packs in pretty
> much unchanged. Have you seen anybody caving with a "pig" lately? Most of
> the material in the techniques section is new or was extensively revised.
> But two chapters about topographic maps were not, and it is still assumed
> you're working with a paper topographic map ordered from the USGS based on
> a state index map. There is no clue that maps can now be downloaded (start
> at nationalmap.gov) and of course no mention at all of Google Earth.
> Chapters on first aid, SRT, and conservation are nicely done, without
> excessive detail. A chapter on leading cave trips, while it seems out of
> place in a beginners' book, is nice; the following chapter on leadership
> skills is less so. Photography and videography were not covered in the
> earlier book. Here they are, with nice chapters by Dave Bunnell and Ben von
> Cramen, professionals in the fields. I do wish the video chapter had not
> punted on editing, something that, to judge by some of the grotto programs
> I've seen, is often sorely lacking. Under science, the geology and biology
> chapters are new, and the archaeology chapter has been updated. A new
> chapter on anthropology seems rather arm-wavy and mostly raises questions.
> There are twenty-seven chapters in all.
>
> The advice in the book is generally sound. But why can't the NSS publish a
> committee-written book that is any good _as a book_? Most of the "On" books
> are terrible, and this new edition of "Caving Basics" sets a new low. Did
> anybody actually read it before it was printed? There are plenty of things
> to entertain anyone bothered by bad style or grammar, but even someone who
> isn't, in these days of tweets, will be annoyed by the chapter in which the
> promised Figure 1 and Table 1 are nowhere to be found or amused by the
> statement that the job of the call-out person is to take action if the
> group does get out on time. I could go on, but it's too sad.--Bill Mixon
>
> 
> Always forgive your enemies after they are hanged.
> 
> You may "reply" to the address this message
> (unless it's a TexasCavers list post)
> came from, but for long-term use, save:
> Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
> AMCS: a...@mexicancaves.org or sa...@mexicancaves.org
>
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>



-- 
Charlie Loving
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[Texascavers] book review: Caving Basics

[Mixon Bill via Texascavers]

"Caving Basics: A Comprehensive Guide for Beginning Cavers," fourth edition. 
Edited by Dean Wiseman and Curt Harler. National Speleological Society, 2016. 
ISBN 978-1-68044-007-7. 8.5 by 11 inches, 271 pages, softbound. $25 (NSS 
members $22.50, life members $20).

This book updates, sometimes not enough, the third edition that was published 
almost twenty-five years ago. The overall design is similar, with major 
sections on equipment, techniques, and cave science. The main revolution in 
equipment over that period, at least for a beginner with no need for 
battery-powered hammer drills, has been LED lighting, and the all-new chapter 
on lights covers those, but mainly relatively expensive types that are perhaps 
overkill for the intended reader. Are there no batteries smaller than AA? The 
chapter on caving clothes is new; most other parts of this section are just 
warmed over. The chapter on packs in pretty much unchanged. Have you seen 
anybody caving with a "pig" lately? Most of the material in the techniques 
section is new or was extensively revised. But two chapters about topographic 
maps were not, and it is still assumed you're working with a paper topographic 
map ordered from the USGS based on a state index map. There is no clue that 
maps can now be downloaded (start at nationalmap.gov) and of course no mention 
at all of Google Earth. Chapters on first aid, SRT, and conservation are nicely 
done, without excessive detail. A chapter on leading cave trips, while it seems 
out of place in a beginners' book, is nice; the following chapter on leadership 
skills is less so. Photography and videography were not covered in the earlier 
book. Here they are, with nice chapters by Dave Bunnell and Ben von Cramen, 
professionals in the fields. I do wish the video chapter had not punted on 
editing, something that, to judge by some of the grotto programs I've seen, is 
often sorely lacking. Under science, the geology and biology chapters are new, 
and the archaeology chapter has been updated. A new chapter on anthropology 
seems rather arm-wavy and mostly raises questions. There are twenty-seven 
chapters in all.

The advice in the book is generally sound. But why can't the NSS publish a 
committee-written book that is any good _as a book_? Most of the "On" books are 
terrible, and this new edition of "Caving Basics" sets a new low. Did anybody 
actually read it before it was printed? There are plenty of things to entertain 
anyone bothered by bad style or grammar, but even someone who isn't, in these 
days of tweets, will be annoyed by the chapter in which the promised Figure 1 
and Table 1 are nowhere to be found or amused by the statement that the job of 
the call-out person is to take action if the group does get out on time. I 
could go on, but it's too sad.--Bill Mixon


Always forgive your enemies after they are hanged.

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[Texascavers] book review: Than Xe Bang Fai

[Mixon Bill via Texascavers]

"The Great Cave of the Xe Bang Fai." Edited by David E. Bunnell and Patricia 
Kambesis. National Speleological Society, 2016. ISBN 978-1-68044-005-8. 11.5 
inches wide by 8 inches, 128 pages, hardbound. $18 (NSS members $16.20, life 
members $14.40).

Tham Xe Bang Fai in Laos is one of the great caves in Indochina. It, like the 
even more spectacular Vietnamese cave featured in the June 2016 NSS News, is a 
site of adventure-tourism development. The cave, first noted by Westerners in 
1905 and then forgotten, was surveyed by joint American-Canadian-Lao teams 
during trips in 2006, 2008, and 2015. After a 2016 connection to Tham Nguen, 
not included in the map, the system is 16 kilometers long.

The book, reasonably priced for a hardbound book of color photographs, begins 
with brief discussions by various authors of topics like the history of the 
cave and its exploration and survey, the biology and culture of the surrounding 
area, and the techniques used by photographer Dave Bunnell to capture the large 
passages and massive formations in the cave. A detailed and nicely drafted map 
of the cave is spread across several pages, marred slightly by the lack of 
margins at the binding edges of the pages. The bulk of the book, starting on 
page 28, consists of large color photographs of the cave, mostly by Bunnell. 
They give a comprehensive view of the cave and are generally well reproduced, 
although I have reservations about the excess of blue in a number of them; 
compare figures 86 and 87, for instance. The curious but clever photo of the 
pool at the downstream entrance on page 122 is explained in the caption.

A very nice book about a very nice cave.—Bill Mixon

Always forgive your enemies after they are hanged.

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[Texascavers] book review Mexico cave critters

[Mixon Bill via Texascavers]

Encyclopædia Biospeologica: México, by José Palacios-Vargas, Christian 
Juberthie, and James R. Reddell. International Society for Subterranean Biology 
and Unión Mexicana de Agrupaciones Espeleológica, México D.F., as Mundos 
Subterráneos 26–27; 2015. 8.5 by 11 inches, 101 pages, softbound.

This work was originally begun as a replacement in the second edition for the 
unsatisfactory chapter on Mexico in volume 1 of the Encyclopædia Biospeologica 
that was published in 1994, but no second edition was published, so it was 
expanded into this book. Following some introductory material on the country's 
karst areas and the history of cave biology in Mexico, it contains catalogs of 
the subterranean fauna: aquatic sixteen pages, terrestrial forty-two pages, and 
microbiota eight pages. The twenty-four-page bibliography lists approximately 
six hundred items. It is available in the U.S. for $12 plus postage from the 
Association for Mexican Cave Studies; see 
www.mexicancaves.org/finance/order.html for ordering information and 
www.mexicancaves.org/other/otherpubs.html for details on the book and also 
thousands of pages of free PDF files of other books on Mexican cave 
biology.—Bill Mixon
(Or ask me to take a copy to UT Grotto meeting for you.)

What great comfort is there to be derived from a wife well obeyed!—Anthony 
Trollope, Barchester Towers

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Re: [Texascavers] book review: Underwater Potholer

[Stefan Creaser via Texascavers]

I just bought this on Amazon (Smile) for $22.07. I would suggest you do the 
same if interested coz there is now only 11 left :-)

Cheers,
Stefan


-Original Message-
From: Texascavers [mailto:texascavers-boun...@texascavers.com] On Behalf Of 
Mixon Bill via Texascavers

Underwater Potholer: A Cave Diver's Memoirs, by Duncan Price. Whittles 
Publishing, Scotland, 2015. ISBN 978-184995-158-6. 6.5 by 9.5 inches, 185 
pages, softbound. £18.99, $24.95.

"Cave diving is dangerous--do _not_ do it. Remember I told you so. Everything 
else I say is bollocks!"

This book is a welcome addition to the small number of well-written cavers' 
memoirs in English, most which have come from British cavers. Duncan Price has 
had a long and active career in cave diving, and he has worked with pretty much 
all of the other British cave divers I've ever heard of. Most of his diving has 
been sump diving in the UK, especially in the part of it where w is a vowel. 
But he has also laid new line in France and the US. Sometimes the blow-by-blows 
of some of his more complicated sump dives get a bit tedious, but there are 
flashes of understated humor or drama. Some cave maps can help with the 
geography, but they are all grouped together as pages XI–XIX, apparently as an 
afterthought. The sixteen unnumbered pages of color photos could have used a 
lot of adjustment. But these production problems do not detract seriously from 
enjoyment of the book.

Besides sump diving, which often includes difficult dry caving to reach the 
sump, Price has done tri-mix diving, rebreather diving, and scooter diving, 
despite the fact that his only formal training certification is from the 
British Sub-Aqua Club--for snorkeling. A lot of cave divers will be amused, or 
not, by a certain cavalier attitude about equipment. "One of my regulators 
started free-flowing on account of the cold water even before I'd set off; I 
hit it against a rock at the entrance until it stopped leaking and then headed 
into the cave." He did a dive using a home-made rebreather borrowed from Rick 
Stanton after receiving instruction in its use: breathe in, breathe out, add 
gas as required.

Do _not_ do it, but do read it.—Bill Mixon

A man cannot be too careful in his choice of enemies.



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[Texascavers] book review: Underwater Potholer

[Mixon Bill via Texascavers]

Underwater Potholer: A Cave Diver's Memoirs, by Duncan Price. Whittles 
Publishing, Scotland, 2015. ISBN 978-184995-158-6. 6.5 by 9.5 inches, 185 
pages, softbound. £18.99, $24.95.

"Cave diving is dangerous--do _not_ do it. Remember I told you so. Everything 
else I say is bollocks!"

This book is a welcome addition to the small number of well-written cavers' 
memoirs in English, most which have come from British cavers. Duncan Price has 
had a long and active career in cave diving, and he has worked with pretty much 
all of the other British cave divers I've ever heard of. Most of his diving has 
been sump diving in the UK, especially in the part of it where w is a vowel. 
But he has also laid new line in France and the US. Sometimes the blow-by-blows 
of some of his more complicated sump dives get a bit tedious, but there are 
flashes of understated humor or drama. Some cave maps can help with the 
geography, but they are all grouped together as pages XI–XIX, apparently as an 
afterthought. The sixteen unnumbered pages of color photos could have used a 
lot of adjustment. But these production problems do not detract seriously from 
enjoyment of the book.

Besides sump diving, which often includes difficult dry caving to reach the 
sump, Price has done tri-mix diving, rebreather diving, and scooter diving, 
despite the fact that his only formal training certification is from the 
British Sub-Aqua Club--for snorkeling. A lot of cave divers will be amused, or 
not, by a certain cavalier attitude about equipment. "One of my regulators 
started free-flowing on account of the cold water even before I'd set off; I 
hit it against a rock at the entrance until it stopped leaking and then headed 
into the cave." He did a dive using a home-made rebreather borrowed from Rick 
Stanton after receiving instruction in its use: breathe in, breathe out, add 
gas as required.

Do _not_ do it, but do read it.—Bill Mixon

A man cannot be too careful in his choice of enemies.

You may "reply" to the address this message
(unless it's a TexasCavers list post)
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: a...@mexicancaves.org or sa...@mexicancaves.org

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Re: [Texascavers] book review: Underwater Potholer

[Mixon Bill via Texascavers]

Considering that the official release date of the book is October 7, 2015, I 
imagine Amazon will be able to get more if it needs to. I got mine on Amazon, 
too, but I quoted the publisher's list price. Presumably just about everybody 
knows he can get it at least a little bit cheaper on Amazon. -- Mixon

A man cannot be too careful in his choice of enemies.

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[Texascavers] book review: cavers autobiography

[Mixon Bill via Texascavers]

"Licking the Ceiling: The Caving Logbook of A. Bryant Betsill." A. Bryant 
Betsill. CreateSpace, 2014. ISBN 978-1494724207. 6 by 9 inches, 380 pages, 
softbound. $15.
Quotes from the author's caving logbook, since lost, from early 1984 through, 
with a few exceptions, 1994, each entry followed by one to several pages of 
trip report written later. The trip reports are entertaining in spots, but they 
are the sort that includes travel, camping, and meals, and there _are_ an awful 
lot of them. Most of the trips were just tourist-caving during TAG events or 
trips with youth groups; the author wrote the first caving manual for Venture 
Scouts. Notable mainly as the first time, as far as I know, an American caver 
has self-published his caving autobiography, in this case with Amazon's 
CreateSpace.—Bill Mixon

True bravery is shown by performing without witnesses what one might be capable 
of doing before all the world.

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Re: [Texascavers] book review: cave rescue manual

[Mark Minton via Texascavers]

  Back in the '80s, some Swiss cavers on a recon mission on Cerro Rabon
(highlands east of Huautla, Oaxaca, Mexico) did a 200-meter drop on 8-mm
rope. They were used to skinny rope, but that was extreme even for them.
Afterwards they said, Our eyes were very wide! 8-mm rope gets really
small when you weight it on a rack or bobbin...

Mark Minton
mmin...@caver.net

On Fri, August 21, 2015 4:05 pm, Les Ward via Texascavers wrote:
 Let me know when you'd like to take me on a trip that involves 9mm rope.
 I'll pretend I've never seen it before, just for the joy of being on it.
 I'll even bring some other flashing light guys with me. Though, be
 warned, two of us are ones that got strange looks from NCRC instructors as
 we did a 30' muenter hitch rap on 8mm. (It's what we had available)
 Anyway, nice write up.

 Les Ward

 P.S. We don't like the parasites either

 Sent from my iPhone...

 On Aug 21, 2015, at 11:14, Mixon Bill via Texascavers
 texascavers@texascavers.com wrote:

 Manual of U.S. Cave Rescue Techniques, third edition, edited by Anmar
 Mirza. National Cave Rescue Commission, 2015. ISBN 237230362.
 Approximately 250 pages, 8.5 by 11 inches, softbound, $50.

 This book, a much-needed and thorough revision of the 1988 second
 edition, is a bound version of a collection of chapters, with pages
 numbered independently, that are used in looseleaf form during
 cave-rescue courses offered by the National Cave Rescue Commission of
 the NSS. The thirty-six chapters have version numbers, like software,
 ranging from 1.2 to 2.3, and presumably the looseleaf versions have been
 evolving and will continue to do so, but it is valuable that a bound
 book is available for permanent reference. Twenty authors are listed,
 plus whoever wrote the thirteen anonymous chapters. The numerous
 illustrations are clear and a lot better than those in the second
 edition.

 The National Cave Rescue Commission is charged with coordination between
 cavers and civil agencies, and a large fraction of its training
 customers are professional emergency personnel, so catering to them is
 not surprising. There are references to local protocols and Form 205 and
 even a few mentions of half-inch rope, which cavers haven't used since
 the Manila Age. I'd like to be there when a fireman encounters a
 9-millimeter rope hanging in a pit.

 But there is a lot in the book that should be of interest even to cavers
 who hope never to be involved in a 911 emergency situation. There are
 succinct descriptions of various vertical systems and a good discussion
 of knots. A lot of the material about rigging is pertinent to any
 vertical caving, as long as one recognizes what some of it is important
 only when one is lifting a loaded litter with attendant. There is little
 about first-aid beyond stopping major blood loss and preventing
 hyperthermia, but realistically there is little that can be done in the
 cave. CPR is not likely to work in cases of trauma. There is a chapter
 on small-party self-rescue, and a lot of other things in the book are
 relevant to that, too, such as ways of lowering a person immobilized on
 rope besides the dangerous and last-resort pickoff. One thing worth
 noting is that a Gibbs-type ascender, rather than the toothed-cam sort,
 is preferable for many hauling uses, and a caving party might have a
 couple along, plus a small pulley or so, even if none is part of
 anyone's climbing system. Of course a large part of the book is devoted
 to packaging a patient in a litter and hauling it out of the cave. If it
 comes to that, the guys with flashing lights and their parasites the
 press will almost certainly be involved.

 I recommend the Manual of U.S. Cave Rescue Techniques to any serious
 caver, perhaps to be read selectively. Some precautions are in order.
 Parts will appeal most to caves who were in the military and enjoyed it,
 the reader will frequently encounter more than just a whiff of lawyers,
 and anyone who knows that a patient should have their is not good
 English will be driven mad.
 -Bill Mixon


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[Texascavers] book review: cave rescue manual

[Mixon Bill via Texascavers]

Manual of U.S. Cave Rescue Techniques, third edition, edited by Anmar Mirza. 
National Cave Rescue Commission, 2015. ISBN 237230362. Approximately 250 
pages, 8.5 by 11 inches, softbound, $50.

This book, a much-needed and thorough revision of the 1988 second edition, is a 
bound version of a collection of chapters, with pages numbered independently, 
that are used in looseleaf form during cave-rescue courses offered by the 
National Cave Rescue Commission of the NSS. The thirty-six chapters have 
version numbers, like software, ranging from 1.2 to 2.3, and presumably the 
looseleaf versions have been evolving and will continue to do so, but it is 
valuable that a bound book is available for permanent reference. Twenty authors 
are listed, plus whoever wrote the thirteen anonymous chapters. The numerous 
illustrations are clear and a lot better than those in the second edition.

The National Cave Rescue Commission is charged with coordination between cavers 
and civil agencies, and a large fraction of its training customers are 
professional emergency personnel, so catering to them is not surprising. There 
are references to local protocols and Form 205 and even a few mentions of 
half-inch rope, which cavers haven't used since the Manila Age. I'd like to be 
there when a fireman encounters a 9-millimeter rope hanging in a pit.

But there is a lot in the book that should be of interest even to cavers who 
hope never to be involved in a 911 emergency situation. There are succinct 
descriptions of various vertical systems and a good discussion of knots. A lot 
of the material about rigging is pertinent to any vertical caving, as long as 
one recognizes what some of it is important only when one is lifting a loaded 
litter with attendant. There is little about first-aid beyond stopping major 
blood loss and preventing hyperthermia, but realistically there is little that 
can be done in the cave. CPR is not likely to work in cases of trauma. There is 
a chapter on small-party self-rescue, and a lot of other things in the book are 
relevant to that, too, such as ways of lowering a person immobilized on rope 
besides the dangerous and last-resort pickoff. One thing worth noting is that 
a Gibbs-type ascender, rather than the toothed-cam sort, is preferable for many 
hauling uses, and a caving party might have a couple along, plus a small pulley 
or so, even if none is part of anyone's climbing system. Of course a large part 
of the book is devoted to packaging a patient in a litter and hauling it out of 
the cave. If it comes to that, the guys with flashing lights and their 
parasites the press will almost certainly be involved.

I recommend the Manual of U.S. Cave Rescue Techniques to any serious caver, 
perhaps to be read selectively. Some precautions are in order. Parts will 
appeal most to caves who were in the military and enjoyed it, the reader will 
frequently encounter more than just a whiff of lawyers, and anyone who knows 
that a patient should have their is not good English will be driven mad.
—Bill Mixon














He who renders warfare fatal to all engaged in it
will be the greatest benefactor the world has yet known.--Sir Richard Burton

You may reply to the address this message
(unless it's a TexasCavers list post)
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Re: [Texascavers] book review: cave rescue manual

[Les Ward via Texascavers]

Let me know when you'd like to take me on a trip that involves 9mm rope. I'll 
pretend I've never seen it before, just for the joy of being on it. I'll even 
bring some other flashing light guys with me. Though, be warned, two of us 
are ones that got strange looks from NCRC instructors as we did a 30' muenter 
hitch rap on 8mm. (It's what we had available) Anyway, nice write up. 

Les Ward

P.S. We don't like the parasites either

Sent from my iPhone...

 On Aug 21, 2015, at 11:14, Mixon Bill via Texascavers 
 texascavers@texascavers.com wrote:
 
 Manual of U.S. Cave Rescue Techniques, third edition, edited by Anmar Mirza. 
 National Cave Rescue Commission, 2015. ISBN 237230362. Approximately 250 
 pages, 8.5 by 11 inches, softbound, $50.
 
 This book, a much-needed and thorough revision of the 1988 second edition, is 
 a bound version of a collection of chapters, with pages numbered 
 independently, that are used in looseleaf form during cave-rescue courses 
 offered by the National Cave Rescue Commission of the NSS. The thirty-six 
 chapters have version numbers, like software, ranging from 1.2 to 2.3, and 
 presumably the looseleaf versions have been evolving and will continue to do 
 so, but it is valuable that a bound book is available for permanent 
 reference. Twenty authors are listed, plus whoever wrote the thirteen 
 anonymous chapters. The numerous illustrations are clear and a lot better 
 than those in the second edition.
 
 The National Cave Rescue Commission is charged with coordination between 
 cavers and civil agencies, and a large fraction of its training customers are 
 professional emergency personnel, so catering to them is not surprising. 
 There are references to local protocols and Form 205 and even a few mentions 
 of half-inch rope, which cavers haven't used since the Manila Age. I'd like 
 to be there when a fireman encounters a 9-millimeter rope hanging in a pit.
 
 But there is a lot in the book that should be of interest even to cavers who 
 hope never to be involved in a 911 emergency situation. There are succinct 
 descriptions of various vertical systems and a good discussion of knots. A 
 lot of the material about rigging is pertinent to any vertical caving, as 
 long as one recognizes what some of it is important only when one is lifting 
 a loaded litter with attendant. There is little about first-aid beyond 
 stopping major blood loss and preventing hyperthermia, but realistically 
 there is little that can be done in the cave. CPR is not likely to work in 
 cases of trauma. There is a chapter on small-party self-rescue, and a lot of 
 other things in the book are relevant to that, too, such as ways of lowering 
 a person immobilized on rope besides the dangerous and last-resort pickoff. 
 One thing worth noting is that a Gibbs-type ascender, rather than the 
 toothed-cam sort, is preferable for many hauling uses, and a caving party 
 might have a couple along, plus a small pulley or so, even if none is part of 
 anyone's climbing system. Of course a large part of the book is devoted to 
 packaging a patient in a litter and hauling it out of the cave. If it comes 
 to that, the guys with flashing lights and their parasites the press will 
 almost certainly be involved.
 
 I recommend the Manual of U.S. Cave Rescue Techniques to any serious caver, 
 perhaps to be read selectively. Some precautions are in order. Parts will 
 appeal most to caves who were in the military and enjoyed it, the reader will 
 frequently encounter more than just a whiff of lawyers, and anyone who knows 
 that a patient should have their is not good English will be driven mad.
 —Bill Mixon
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 He who renders warfare fatal to all engaged in it
 will be the greatest benefactor the world has yet known.--Sir Richard Burton
 
 You may reply to the address this message
 (unless it's a TexasCavers list post)
 came from, but for long-term use, save:
 Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
 AMCS: a...@mexicancaves.org or sa...@mexicancaves.org
 
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[Texascavers] book review: Caves of Burnsville Cove, Virginia

[Mixon Bill via Texascavers]

The Caves of Burnsville Cove, Virginia: Fifty Years of Exploration and Science, 
edited by William B. White, Springer International Publishing, 2015. 7.5 by 10 
inches, 479 pages; hardbound ISBN 978-3-319-14390-3, $179; e-book ISBN 
978-3-319-14391-0, $139

Burnsville Cove, nestled among the ridges of the Appalachians, has been one of 
the major caving areas in the eastern United States since the mid-1950s, when 
Nittany Grotto cavers began their survey of Breathing Cave, now over 6 miles 
long. Other long caves in the cove are the Butler–Sinking Creek System, 16.7 
miles, the Chestnut Ridge Cave System, 21 miles, and Helictite Cave, 7.3 miles. 
Over ninety other caves are known. Cavers formed the Butler Cave Conservation 
Society, which, along with some of its members, bought or leased many of the 
cave entrances in the area.

This book, one of a Cave and Karst Systems of the World series and a 
contribution of the Butler Cave Conservation Society, is a somewhat strange 
one for Springer, which specializes in expensive technical books for sale to 
libraries and professionals. Over half of it, thirteen chapters, is devoted to 
cave descriptions and histories of their exploration, often basically trip 
reports, or the BCCS itself. Over one hundred pages are about the caves of the 
Water Sinks area. For much more extensive coverage of that area, see Phil 
Lucas's Caves and Karst of the Water Sinks Area, available as a free PDF file 
from lulu.com; search for water sinks. Less than half of the book is devoted 
to ten chapters on the geology and hydrology of the caves and the area. (There 
are no chapters on biology.) Of course this means the book should be mainly of 
interest to cavers. The book contains hundreds of color photos, mostly small, 
and many cave maps. A free on-line supplement at 
http://extras.springer.com/2015/978-3-319-14390-3 contains 80 MB of maps of 
caves of Burnsville Cove, including an eleven-sheet detailed map of Butler Cave 
that might have been assembled into a single image, but it wouldn't have been 
easy—I tried.

The question, of course, is how the hell this important book about caves and 
caving fell into the hands of Springer. The editor is certainly well beyond the 
point of needing to pad his academic credentials. Commercial publication might 
have bought careful copy editing, skillful photo preparation, and a 
professionally compiled index, but it didn't. If a volunteer was found to do 
the layout, some organization like the BCCS or the Virginia Speleological 
Survey could have published this book, in a cheaper binding and perhaps with 
more compact typesetting and selective use of color, and sold it at a 
substantial markup for forty bucks. But here we have a $179 Springer book that 
will, I suppose, end up in more university libraries but in almost no 
cavers'.—Bill Mixon

Rules to live by: Don't. And don't forget to.

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[Texascavers] book review: Karst of the Urban Corridor

[Mixon Bill via Texascavers]

Karst of the Urban Corridor: Bell, Bexar, Comal, Hays, Travis, and  
Williamson Counties, Texas. Kevin W. Stafford with Katherine Arens.  
Texas Speleological Survey Karst Awareness and Education Series 1,  
Austin; 2014. ISBN 978-0-9906938-0-2. 8.5 by 11 inches, 110 pages,  
softbound. $20; see www.texasspeleologicalsurvey.org/PDF/TSSprices.pdf.


The counties of the urban corridor are strung out along I-35 from  
north of Austin to San Antonio. Here the limestone hills meet the  
coastal plain. San Antonio, with a population of about 1.5 million,  
relies on the karst Edwards Aquifer for its water supply. Between  
there and Austin, the towns of New Braunfels and San Marcus grew up  
around large karst springs that today, along with Barton Springs in  
Austin, are mainly seen as recreational resources, although biologists  
find much of interest in them. The population in the area is growing  
rapidly; Austin has more than doubled in population since I moved here  
in 1981. This leads to the usual problems of development on karst,  
with risks of excessive withdrawals from the aquifer and pollution of  
it. Caves in the area include Honey Creek Cave, Texas's longest, and  
some show caves, including Natural Bridge Caverns, good on a national  
scale. Numerous mostly small caves harbor a lot of rare species.


Most of the publications of the Texas Speleological Survey have been  
typical caves of books covering counties or other areas. Karst of  
the Urban Corridor is meant to educate the public about the value of  
and risks to the caves and the various segments of the Edwards Aquifer  
along the escarpment. It explains the geology of the area and how the  
aquifer works. The biology of aquifer and caves is described. There  
are blind catfish known only from deep wells in San Antonio; they have  
never been seen in their natural habitat. And of course environmental  
issues are pretty thoroughly discussed. After general coverage of the  
area, the counties are briefly covered one by one, with a few typical  
caves described. An effort has obviously been made to make the more  
technical parts accessible. Unfortunately much of that was crude,  
consisting of inserting distracting parenthetical comments. Appendixes  
include a list of cave- and karst-related clubs and agencies in the  
area, a large bibliography, a glossary, and an index. The book is  
nicely produced, with color photos on almost every page and clear  
diagrams.—Bill Mixon


A gentleman is one who never hurts anyone’s feelings unintentionally.

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[Texascavers] book review: deep cave dives

[Mixon Bill via Texascavers]

Fatally Flawed: The Quest to be Deepest. Verna van Schaik.  
Originally published by Liquid Edge Press, South Africa; 2008. Amazon  
version 2011, 196 pages softbound, ISBN 987-0-620-40472-3, $9.90.  
Kindle version $3.99.


This is not a new book, but new to me. Amazon makes it easy to self- 
publish a book in small quantities, but it's up to you to do the  
publicity.
Verna van Schaik set a women's scuba depth record in 2004 of 221  
meters (725 feet) in Boesmansgat (or Bushman's Hole), a water-filled  
pit in South Africa. This book is about overcoming sexism and her  
fears to accomplish that goal. Her feminism does not extend to  
wondering why there are separate men's and women's records, even  
though the least possible exertion is important to success in deep  
dives. Dives of that magnitude are not, needless to say, simple, and  
the team and logistics were elaborate. One of the appendixes is a  
decompression table for a high-altitude dive to 220 meters.


Perhaps more interesting, though, is the last part of the book. Van  
Schaik was the surface marshall for the attempted recovery of a body  
from –260 meters in Boesmansgat in 2005, and she found herself in  
charge when carefully made plans were blown up by the death of the  
deepest diver and serious illness in the deepest support diver. All  
divers were to use rebreathers, and the deep support divers were going  
to be visited only once every hour during their long decompressions.  
But the nausea and disorientation of the ill diver required constant  
attendance, with much difficult juggling of tanks and qualified  
divers. He was finally hauled out of the water during his 20-foot  
decompression stop, since there was a chamber at the site. (This  
incident is also the subject of Raising the Dead, Harper Sport,  
2008.) The author gives her analysis of what went wrong and discusses  
the role of ego in such endeavors. A good read.—Bill Mixon


A gentleman is one who never hurts anyone’s feelings unintentionally.

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[Texascavers] book review: The Longest Year

[Mixon Bill via Texascavers]

The Longest Year: The Indiana Caverns Development Story. Gary  
Roberson. Corydon, Indiana Caverns; 2014. 6 by 9 inches, 279 pages.  
Softbound ISBN 978-1-4951-0416-9, $16.95; hardbound ISBN  
978-1-4951-0417-6, $29.95.
Way too much information about the trials and tribulations of  
developing a small show cave on a tight schedule. If you have the same  
idea, you probably should read it.—Bill Mixon


I didn't do it. You can't prove it. Nobody saw it. The sheep are lying.

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Re: [Texascavers] book review: Fern Cave

[Jerry via Texascavers]

Kinda sounds like the pot calling the kettle black, Phil.  ;)
 
Jerry.
 
 
-Original Message-
From: Phil Winkler via Texascavers texascavers@texascavers.com
To: texascavers texascavers@texascavers.com
Sent: Thu, Aug 14, 2014 9:10 pm
Subject: Re: [Texascavers] book review: Fern Cave


Gees, Bill,

If you can't say something nice don't say anything at all. 

Jenn's book is a superb summary of the discovery and exploration of one of our 
greatest caves. Her writing is passionate and on topic, factual and timely. She 
brings everything up to date from Donal Myrick's classic publication from the 
early 70s.

I've been in the cave dozens of times from the early 70s thru the 80s until 
even 
2000 with JV. It is a major cave with so much diversity with formations, 
passage, pits and complexity, not to mention the huge colonies of grey bats in 
the Morgue section.

Phil
On Aug 14, 2014, at 10:41 PM, Mixon Bill via Texascavers wrote:

 Fern Cave: The Discovery, Exploration, and History of Alabama's  Greatest 
Cave. Jennifer Ellen Pinkley. Blue Bat Books, 2014. ISBN  978-0-9903547-0-3. 
6.5 
by 8.5 inches, 371 pages. Softbound $25, $10  for Kindle or Nook e-book from 
www.bluebatbooks.com.
 When I visited Fern Cave, it consisted of a short stream passage and  
 Surprise 
Pit. By that time, the route to the new rigging point, which  provided a dry 
404-foot rappel, had been Toroded to the point that the  step across the 
four-hundred-foot-deep gap in the ledge was only  moderately scary. Nearby, New 
Fern was discovered and explored through  several entrances. It was finally 
connected to Fern Cave, and the  whole took over the name. So I'll have to call 
the original cave old  Fern, I guess.
 Fern Cave is more than fifteen miles long and is essentially a  vertical 
 maze, 
with many levels connected by numerous drops. The part  of the cave in the 
vicinity of the Morgue Entrance contains the  largest hibernaculum of gray 
bats, 
which have been declared endangered  by the feds. So most of the entrances to 
the cave were purchased by  the Fish and Wildlife Service as a detached part of 
the nearby Wheeler  National Wildlife Refuge. The owner of old Fern was not 
interesting in  selling, and the connections between it and the rest of the 
cave 
are  obscure or dangerous, so the FWS didn't pursue the matter. Relations  
between the Huntsville Grotto and the FWS were good, and the grotto  was 
allowed 
to manage the FWS parts of Fern, provided that no caving  was done in the 
gray-bat section during the hibernating season. The  grotto established a 
permit 
system, and exploration and mapping  continued. Old Fern and Surprise Pit 
continued to be open without red  tape, and eventually they were purchased by 
the Southeast Cave  Conservancy.
 Then white-nose syndrome appeared, and the Fish and Wildlife Service  
 declared 
that all caving should stop in states where it occurred and  all adjacent 
states. Naturally this was ridiculed and widely ignored,  but caves owned by 
the 
US Forest Service or the FWS and other parts of  the Department of the Interior 
were declared closed, and the agreement  with the Huntsville Grotto to manage 
Fern Cave ended. Even the  Southeast Cave Conservancy jerked its knee, and old 
Fern was closed,  although it has since reopened. When some research access by 
cavers to  Fern Cave was allowed years later, it was found that, in the absence 
 
of the grotto's management and the monitoring that it allowed, some  vandalism 
had occurred in Fern despite the official closure. (None of  the entrances to 
the cave have been gated.) White-nose syndrome has  affected tri-colored bats 
in 
New Fern, and sensitive tests have  detected its DNA in swabs from hibernating 
gray bats, but so far they  seem unharmed.
 Pinkley's book is a very nice, reasonably priced summary of the  history of 
the cave from the original discovery and descent of old  Fern through today. 
There are numerous black-and-white photos, many of  considerable historical 
interest. I initially found reading the book a  bit tedious, but that turned 
out 
to be just because the prose would  probably be recommended for middle-school 
students by those computer  programs that rate the difficulty of a text. I got 
used to it, and  certainly I can't claim the book is difficult to understand. 
Embedded  are personal accounts of some of the author's own involvement in the  
cave. She is very bitter about the FWS's turning on the cavers that  had done 
so 
much to help them before WNS appeared, but actually they  had no choice but to 
march to the drums in DC. The limited vandalism,  mainly spray-painted arrows 
and scratched names, that occurred during  the time the cave was effectively 
unmanaged, if officially closed,  distresses her greatly, although I'd say it 
wasn't that big a deal for  a fifteen-mile cave. It is a lesson, though, that 
managing an open  cave, even if not foolproof, can be better than an 
ineffective 
closure

Re: [Texascavers] book review: Fern Cave

[Phil Winkler via Texascavers]

Gees, Bill,

If you can't say something nice don't say anything at all. 

Jenn's book is a superb summary of the discovery and exploration of one of our 
greatest caves. Her writing is passionate and on topic, factual and timely. She 
brings everything up to date from Donal Myrick's classic publication from the 
early 70s.

I've been in the cave dozens of times from the early 70s thru the 80s until 
even 2000 with JV. It is a major cave with so much diversity with formations, 
passage, pits and complexity, not to mention the huge colonies of grey bats in 
the Morgue section.

Phil
On Aug 14, 2014, at 10:41 PM, Mixon Bill via Texascavers wrote:

 Fern Cave: The Discovery, Exploration, and History of Alabama's  Greatest 
 Cave. Jennifer Ellen Pinkley. Blue Bat Books, 2014. ISBN  978-0-9903547-0-3. 
 6.5 by 8.5 inches, 371 pages. Softbound $25, $10  for Kindle or Nook e-book 
 from www.bluebatbooks.com.
 When I visited Fern Cave, it consisted of a short stream passage and  
 Surprise Pit. By that time, the route to the new rigging point, which  
 provided a dry 404-foot rappel, had been Toroded to the point that the  step 
 across the four-hundred-foot-deep gap in the ledge was only  moderately 
 scary. Nearby, New Fern was discovered and explored through  several 
 entrances. It was finally connected to Fern Cave, and the  whole took over 
 the name. So I'll have to call the original cave old  Fern, I guess.
 Fern Cave is more than fifteen miles long and is essentially a  vertical 
 maze, with many levels connected by numerous drops. The part  of the cave in 
 the vicinity of the Morgue Entrance contains the  largest hibernaculum of 
 gray bats, which have been declared endangered  by the feds. So most of the 
 entrances to the cave were purchased by  the Fish and Wildlife Service as a 
 detached part of the nearby Wheeler  National Wildlife Refuge. The owner of 
 old Fern was not interesting in  selling, and the connections between it and 
 the rest of the cave are  obscure or dangerous, so the FWS didn't pursue the 
 matter. Relations  between the Huntsville Grotto and the FWS were good, and 
 the grotto  was allowed to manage the FWS parts of Fern, provided that no 
 caving  was done in the gray-bat section during the hibernating season. The  
 grotto established a permit system, and exploration and mapping  continued. 
 Old Fern and Surprise Pit continued to be open without red  tape, and 
 eventually they were purchased by the Southeast Cave  Conservancy.
 Then white-nose syndrome appeared, and the Fish and Wildlife Service  
 declared that all caving should stop in states where it occurred and  all 
 adjacent states. Naturally this was ridiculed and widely ignored,  but caves 
 owned by the US Forest Service or the FWS and other parts of  the Department 
 of the Interior were declared closed, and the agreement  with the Huntsville 
 Grotto to manage Fern Cave ended. Even the  Southeast Cave Conservancy jerked 
 its knee, and old Fern was closed,  although it has since reopened. When some 
 research access by cavers to  Fern Cave was allowed years later, it was found 
 that, in the absence  of the grotto's management and the monitoring that it 
 allowed, some  vandalism had occurred in Fern despite the official closure. 
 (None of  the entrances to the cave have been gated.) White-nose syndrome has 
  affected tri-colored bats in New Fern, and sensitive tests have  detected 
 its DNA in swabs from hibernating gray bats, but so far they  seem unharmed.
 Pinkley's book is a very nice, reasonably priced summary of the  history of 
 the cave from the original discovery and descent of old  Fern through today. 
 There are numerous black-and-white photos, many of  considerable historical 
 interest. I initially found reading the book a  bit tedious, but that turned 
 out to be just because the prose would  probably be recommended for 
 middle-school students by those computer  programs that rate the difficulty 
 of a text. I got used to it, and  certainly I can't claim the book is 
 difficult to understand. Embedded  are personal accounts of some of the 
 author's own involvement in the  cave. She is very bitter about the FWS's 
 turning on the cavers that  had done so much to help them before WNS 
 appeared, but actually they  had no choice but to march to the drums in DC. 
 The limited vandalism,  mainly spray-painted arrows and scratched names, that 
 occurred during  the time the cave was effectively unmanaged, if officially 
 closed,  distresses her greatly, although I'd say it wasn't that big a deal 
 for  a fifteen-mile cave. It is a lesson, though, that managing an open  
 cave, even if not foolproof, can be better than an ineffective closure.
 Bill Torode's map of Fern Cave has never been published, and since it  is 
 wall-sized it probably couldn't be. A remapping project has  surveyed around 
 half of the known cave. The only maps in the book are  a couple of very local 
 examples of the detail in 

[Texascavers] book review: archeological investigations

[Mixon Bill]

Cave Explorations in Missouri, Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee, and  
Alabama. Gerard Fowke. St. Louis, J. Missouri; 2013. ISBN  
978-1-940777-06-1. 5.5 by 8.5 inches, softbound, 209 pages. $14.95.


This is an abridged reprint, newly typeset, of Fowke's classic 1922  
Archeological Investigations, bulletin 76 of the Bureau of American  
Ethnology at the Smithsonian Institution. The grayscale illustrations  
in the original are well reproduced. Roughly the first three-quarters  
of the reprint covers about seventy-five caves and a few other sites  
in Missouri; the remainder is devoted to caves in the other states in  
the title. The material in the original that is not included, about a  
quarter of that book, is non-cave material, including archaeology of  
Hawaii. (A couple of modern cave burials in Hawaii are mentioned.)  
Amazon lists at least three recent facsimile reprints of the whole  
book, at higher prices. It isn't hard to find a used original on the  
web for less than the price of this partial reprint.—Bill Mixon


Work is the curse of the drinking class.

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[Texascavers] book review: Sacred Darkness

[Mixon Bill]

Sacred Darkness: A Global Perspective on the Ritual Use of Caves.  
Edited by Holley Moyes. University Press of Colorado, Boulder; 2012.  
ISBN 978-1-60732-177-4. 8.5 by 11 inches, hardbound, 410 pages. $95  
(also available as an e-book for $75).


This is an impressive collection of papers on cave archaeology,  
loosely defined. Besides many papers on the dark zones of caves, there  
are also papers on constructed caves, such as underground spaces in  
Egyptian temples, and shelter-cave art. The coverage is worldwide;  
American readers will probably find the two hundred pages on New World  
archaeology most interesting.


The book is very much meant for readers with the mindset of  
archaeologists or ethnographers, and a reader with a background in the  
natural sciences will be frustrated by papers in which just about  
every statement is hedged, quite appropriately, by could or might,  
especially in cases where alternatives come readily to mind. And  
apparently archaeologists think that all activities not clearly  
related to survival were rituals. Are art for art's sake, bored  
adolescents, and graffiti really modern inventions?—Bill Mixon


To move your oxygen, a haemoglobin molecule contains about 10,000  
atoms and carries 8 atoms of oxygen. A red blood cell contains about  
280 million haemoglobin molecules, and a pint of blood contains about  
160 trillion red blood cells.


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[Texascavers] book review: caves of Meghalaya, India

[Mixon Bill]

Cave Pearls of Meghalaya: A Cave Inventory Covering the Jaintia  
Hills, Meghalaya, India. Volume 1, Pala Range and Kopili Valley.  
Edited by Thomas Arbenz. By the editor, Matzendorf, Switzerland; 2012.  
ISBN 978-3-033-03637-6. A4 (approx. US letter) size, 265 pages  
hardbound, plus disk. $45. Order for $70 postpaid via PayPal to tho...@arbenz.ch 
.


Meghalaya, an Indian state sandwiched between Assam to the north and  
Bangladesh to the south, it the wettest place on earth. Two towns in  
its karst receive over ten meters of monsoon rains every year. Rain  
makes caves. Until the early 1990s, only a couple of caves more than a  
kilometer long were known in India. Then various foreign cavers,  
mainly from Europe, and the Meghalaya Adventurers Association formed  
the Caving in the Abode of the Clouds Project and started  
systematically exploring and surveying caves in Meghalaya. In 2006,  
their interest was drawn to the Pala range of hills, where a village  
headman claimed that Krem Tyngheng was 20 kilometers long. Another  
local, whose wide knowledge of the area was perhaps due to his having  
wives in seven villages, claimed that the cave ran all the way through  
the hills. It turned out that they were both absolutely right.


This book, edited and largely written by Swiss caver Thomas Arbenz,  
chief cartographer for the project since 2002, is another of those  
beautifully produced and lavishly illustrated reports that seem to  
come almost exclusively from Europe. Following an overview of the  
geology and geography of the area, there are chapters on the  
expeditions of 2010, 2011, and 2012, which focused entirely on the  
area covered by this book, followed by three chapters on the cave  
biology of the area. Is there a shorter binomial in all of biology  
than the bat Ia io? Then the inventory starts on page 108. All the  
large and small caves are described, with the longest section, 28  
pages, on the 21.25-kilometer Tyngheng–Dieng Jem System. There are  
regional line plots of the caves superimposed on aerial images, as  
well as nicely drawn detailed maps of all but the least significant  
caves. Just a couple of the maps include profiles; these are  
horizontal river caves, explored, needless to say, during the dry  
season. Only samples of the maps are printed for the longest caves,  
with six full maps as PDF files on the disk inside the back cover. The  
PDFs can be a bit difficult to navigate on screen, because they have  
to be viewed at nearly actual size to see the rich detail and they are  
up to about 100 inches square. But they're still a lot better than an  
88-square-foot paper map, if such a thing could even be made.


A bit pricey by the time the heavy book is mailed from Switzerland,  
but a model project report and valuable reference. Buy it so that  
Arbenz can afford to publish volume 2.

--Bill Mixon

Bigamy is having one wife too many. So is monogamy.


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[Texascavers] book review: European cave-diving sites

[Mixon Bill]

Classic Darksite Diving: Cave Diving Sites of Britain and Europe.  
Martyn Farr. Wild Places, Abergavenny; 2013. ISBN 978-0-9526701-8-6. 6  
by 10 inches, 192 pages, softbound. £27.50.


Famous British cave diver Martyn Farr has compiled this guide to cave- 
diving sites in Europe that are easily accessible and where permission  
is not required or easily gotten. Farr's previous books include The  
Darkness Beckons, a history of cave diving (1980, revised 1991). The  
emphasis is on Great Britain, where sites described include some sea  
caves and flooded mines. But about two thirds of the book is about  
caves, including many well-known ones, on the continent and on islands  
in the Mediterranean.


The material on each site includes color photos, a simplified map,  
detailed directions, and access information. The history of diving at  
each site is discussed in the text, and this make it quite interesting  
even to those who never expect to visit any of them. Each site is  
flagged according to the training needed: cavern, intro, or full cave.  
It is at first glance a bit mysterious that site that have been dove  
to depths of around 600 feet in France are flagged as cavern dives,  
but that is because they have nice entrance pools for cavern diving.  
The need not to exceed one's level of training is emphasized throughout.


Unfortunately, this book is not sold by any of the usual cave-book  
sources in the US. Postpaid from the publisher, Wild Places  
Publishing, PO Box 100, Abergavenny NP7 9WY, United Kingdom, the  
dollar price is $64; dollar checks on US banks are accepted by mail. A  
source with on-line ordering is SpeleoProjects in Switzerland  
(speleoprojects.com); it accepts Visa and Mastercard and will charge  
your credit card €40 (currently about $54). The main difference is  
that the royal mail no longer offers cheap surface mail.—Bill Mixon


Work is the curse of the drinking class.


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[Texascavers] book review: Geología de Cuevas

[Mixon Bill]

There is a very nice new book on cave geology:

Geología de Cuevas
by Arthur Palmer
translated by Javier Mugica Jeréonimo of the Sociedad Espeológica de
Cuba
ISBN 978-0-939748-66-2
502 pages softbound
published by Cave Books for the Unión Internacional de Espeleología

This is the review I wrote of the original English-language edition:

Cave Geology. Arthur N. Palmer. Cave Books, Dayton, Ohio; 2007. ISBN
978-0-939748-66-2. 8.5 by 11 inches, vi + 454 pages, hardbound. $37.95.
 I was looking forward to this book during all the years it was
rumored to be forthcoming, because even Palmer’s journal articles are
unusually lucid. I am not disappointed. This is a very nice book.
  In the first nine chapters, Palmer leads the reader through all
the principles of the geology of solution caves, from elementary
concepts of geology through difficult topics like the chemistry and
dynamics of limestone dissolution. To have done all this in a way that
should be understandable to a high-school senior is a considerable
feat of organization and ability to anticipate students’ questions.
There is no calculus, and where algebraic equations are used, he
generally walks the reader through a numerical example. He is careful
to clarify things that might be misunderstood, such as that by
'lower,' applied to a negative quantity such as  delta34S, he means
more negative, not closer to 0. He is careful to define technical
terms he uses, and he even footnotes the pronunciation of things like
gneiss, polje, and Cvijic, a boon to those of us who learn our geology
from books instead of lectures. When a mechanism is of possible
theoretical interest but unlikely to be significant except in unusual
circumstances, he is careful to point that out. In some of the later
of these chapters, his enthusiasm for giving examples from around the
world does result in a few that are just curiosities and others that
are not explained very clearly or completely. This and a certain
amount of gratuitous citing of references are symptoms of some
indecision about whether the book was to be a textbook or a scholarly
monograph, but at least the reader is exposed to the full diversity of
solution caves.
 Subsequent chapters discuss cave minerals, lava caves, airflow
and weathering in caves, and dating of passages and speleothems. A
chapter on research techniques describes Palmer’s methods for making
careful and accurate vertical surveys of passages in order to study
the effect of geologic structure on a cave, a specialty of his, and
also briefly mentions geophysical techniques, although even a
professional geologist will need specialist help with those. The
fifteenth chapter briefly surveys applications of cave geology to
other fields like land management and water supply. There are over 750
figures, nearly two per page. The roughly one thousand references
listed are almost all in English and almost all from books or academic
journals on paper (the scholarly monograph won out here).
 The layout by the author is fully professional, and there are
only a very few typos or editing glitches.
 Cave Geology is not only the best major book on the subject
available, it is also the cheapest. The main text is 405 large pages
with two columns of fairly small type, so there is a lot there, and
you won't read it in a couple of days or even a week. And, while you
should understand most of it while you're reading it, you won't have
learned it all. I still haven't, even with the help of the other ten
thousand pages of cave geology I've read over too many years. But you
will absorb the general ideas, and this is the book you will go back
to later for the details.

(Sorry, but about all the Spanish I know is más cerveza. Perhaps
someone will translate this or, better, buy the book and write his own
review.)

The only source I know of so far is Javier Mugica Jerónimo, Grupo SAMA,
Sociedad Espeleológica de Cuba, speleo...@gmail.com. The price is US
$38. I hope there it will soon be easily available in Mexico, Spain,
and other Spanish-speaking countries. -- Bill Mixon

PS That was written for a Mexican e-mail list. The English edition is  
available from Cave Books for $38.95, from the NSS bookstore for  
$46.75, from Speleobooks for $49.95, and from Amazon for $37.96, plus  
shipping in all cases. To repeat the (not quite) bottom line in my  
review: Cave Geology is not only the best major book on the subject  
available, it is also the cheapest.


A little sincerity is a dangerous thing, and a great deal of it is  
absolutely fatal.



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For 

RE: [Texascavers] book review: Geología de Cuevas

[George Veni]

I agree with Bill's review of Art's excellent book. I'll add that the 
publishing of this translation of the book was stuck until the International 
Union of Speleology (UIS) provided the financial support to make it possible. 
The UIS' work often happens quietly and unsung. In fact, I frequently hear 
people erroneously call it the ICS, which is the UIS' International Congress of 
Speleology. I'm mentioning this because it is time the UIS starts being 
recognized for its work.

For more information on the UIS, visit its website: www.uis-speleo.org.

George


Sent from my mobile phone



George Veni, Ph.D.
Executive Director
National Cave and Karst Research Institute
400-1 Cascades Avenue
Carlsbad, New Mexico 88220-6215
USA
Office: 575-887-5517
Mobile: 210-863-5919
Fax: 575-887-5523
gv...@nckri.org
www.nckri.org




 Original message 
From: Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com
Date: 2013/09/23 21:53 (GMT-07:00)
To: Cavers Texas texascavers@texascavers.com
Subject: [Texascavers] book review: Geología de Cuevas


There is a very nice new book on cave geology:

Geología de Cuevas
by Arthur Palmer
translated by Javier Mugica Jeréonimo of the Sociedad Espeológica de
Cuba
ISBN 978-0-939748-66-2
502 pages softbound
published by Cave Books for the Unión Internacional de Espeleología

This is the review I wrote of the original English-language edition:

Cave Geology. Arthur N. Palmer. Cave Books, Dayton, Ohio; 2007. ISBN
978-0-939748-66-2. 8.5 by 11 inches, vi + 454 pages, hardbound. $37.95.
  I was looking forward to this book during all the years it was
rumored to be forthcoming, because even Palmer’s journal articles are
unusually lucid. I am not disappointed. This is a very nice book.
   In the first nine chapters, Palmer leads the reader through all
the principles of the geology of solution caves, from elementary
concepts of geology through difficult topics like the chemistry and
dynamics of limestone dissolution. To have done all this in a way that
should be understandable to a high-school senior is a considerable
feat of organization and ability to anticipate students’ questions.
There is no calculus, and where algebraic equations are used, he
generally walks the reader through a numerical example. He is careful
to clarify things that might be misunderstood, such as that by
'lower,' applied to a negative quantity such as  delta34S, he means
more negative, not closer to 0. He is careful to define technical
terms he uses, and he even footnotes the pronunciation of things like
gneiss, polje, and Cvijic, a boon to those of us who learn our geology
from books instead of lectures. When a mechanism is of possible
theoretical interest but unlikely to be significant except in unusual
circumstances, he is careful to point that out. In some of the later
of these chapters, his enthusiasm for giving examples from around the
world does result in a few that are just curiosities and others that
are not explained very clearly or completely. This and a certain
amount of gratuitous citing of references are symptoms of some
indecision about whether the book was to be a textbook or a scholarly
monograph, but at least the reader is exposed to the full diversity of
solution caves.
  Subsequent chapters discuss cave minerals, lava caves, airflow
and weathering in caves, and dating of passages and speleothems. A
chapter on research techniques describes Palmer’s methods for making
careful and accurate vertical surveys of passages in order to study
the effect of geologic structure on a cave, a specialty of his, and
also briefly mentions geophysical techniques, although even a
professional geologist will need specialist help with those. The
fifteenth chapter briefly surveys applications of cave geology to
other fields like land management and water supply. There are over 750
figures, nearly two per page. The roughly one thousand references
listed are almost all in English and almost all from books or academic
journals on paper (the scholarly monograph won out here).
  The layout by the author is fully professional, and there are
only a very few typos or editing glitches.
  Cave Geology is not only the best major book on the subject
available, it is also the cheapest. The main text is 405 large pages
with two columns of fairly small type, so there is a lot there, and
you won't read it in a couple of days or even a week. And, while you
should understand most of it while you're reading it, you won't have
learned it all. I still haven't, even with the help of the other ten
thousand pages of cave geology I've read over too many years. But you
will absorb the general ideas, and this is the book you will go back
to later for the details.

(Sorry, but about all the Spanish I know is más cerveza. Perhaps
someone will translate this or, better, buy the book and write his own
review.)

The only source I know of so far is Javier Mugica Jerónimo, Grupo SAMA,
Sociedad Espeleológica de Cuba

[Texascavers] book review: 1850s book on Postojnska Grotto

[Mixon Bill]

John Oliver's Postojnska Jama of 1856, with an introduction by Trevor  
Shaw. ZRC Publishing House, Ljubljana, Slovenia; 2013. ISBN  
978-961-254-472-0. About 16.5 inches wide by 11.7 high, 183 pp. Free  
73 MB PDF file from www.zrc-sazu.si/en/node/.


This is a color photographic reproduction of a bound manuscript volume  
created by John Oliver in about 1855. The title of the original book  
is, typically for the period, long-winded: A Description of the  
Caverns of Adelsberg in Carniolia, South Austria, being an Adaptation  
of Alois Schaffenrath's Beschreibung der berühmten Grotto bei  
Adelsberg, together with Illustrations and Supplementary Notes from  
various Sources, the Whole Compiled, Translated, and Arranged by John  
Oliver, who visited these Caverns in 1838. (He actually visited the  
cave in 1837.) The book itself, which was purchased by Trevor Shaw in  
1976, is preceded by twenty-six pages of introduction covering the  
history of this book and the story of the German-language book that  
was translated by Oliver, as well as notes about the Postojnska Grotto  
itself during the nineteenth century, when the cave was known by its  
German name. The old book itself consists of forty-eight pages of  
elegant copperplate script--who can do that today?--in two columns on  
lined paper, bound with a number of unlined sheets containing pasted- 
in illustrations from various sources, and also incorporating a  
smaller Appendix booklet of notes and comments by Oliver in his  
regular hand. Trevor Shaw and the publishing house of the Slovenian  
Academy of Sciences and Arts deserve thanks for making this unique  
item, especially the text of Schaffenrath's 1834 now-rare guidebook,  
widely available.—Bill Mixon


A little sincerity is a dangerous thing, and a great deal of it is  
absolutely fatal.



You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: a...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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Re: [Texascavers] book review

[Ted Samsel]

A few years ago (4?), there was land (with a house) available in the area
for sale. When we were in Virginia, we considered looking at it.

Ted

On Mon, Jul 29, 2013 at 8:35 AM, Mark Minton mmin...@caver.net wrote:

 I don't think a pdf version of Water Sinks is available.

 Mark


 At 12:34 AM 7/29/2013, Charles Goldsmith wrote:

 Bill, is the author selling the pdf format anywhere?

 On Sun, Jul 28, 2013 at 11:17 PM, Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com
 wrote:
 I'm sure this won't raise a lot of interest, but...

 Caves and Karst of the Water Sinks Area. Philip C. Lucas. Revised
 edition, 2012. 8.25 by 10.25 inches, 369 pages, hardbound. $95.58 plus
 postage from lulu.com; search for Philip Lucas.

 This is a great book. After I received the privately published book, I
 delayed reviewing it, hoping that the NSS would pick it up, but for some
 reason they passed. They could have published it with almost no effort and
 little risk and sold it for  good  bit less, if only to be of service to
 its members, but a large hardbound book with color illustrations throughout
 cannot be really inexpensive.

 The book is the story of what happens when a caver with an engineering
 bent buys property in Virginia that contains small caves and potential
 digs. The result has been fifteen miles of cave with entrances on Lucas's
 property and that of a neighbor, including the Water Sinks system,
 Helictite Cave, and Wishing Well Cave. The exploration of these caves has
 been unusually well documented, both in trip reports and photographs.
 Besides maps and descriptions of the caves, the book contains reports on
 essentially all the digging or exploration trips, mostly written by Lucas.
 I actually found the trip reports much more interesting reading than the
 formal cave descriptions, as they give a better idea of the caves and the
 effort that went into finding and mapping them. The technical aspects are
 fascinating, especially the innovative ways of temporarily stabilizing
 breakdown and creating airflow to locate connections. Straws, however,
 are nowhere really described.
 The editing by Nathan Farrar is excellent, and the design and layout, by
 Lucas and Farrar, are very well done. Some of the nearly six hundred color
 photographs could have used some color adjustment, but generally they
 illustrate the work and the caves very well. A special effort seems to have
 been made to include lots of clear photographs of the participants in the
 projects. (One of them would make a good hobbit.) Portraits on pages 101
 and 104 are especially nice.

 I can't deny that this is an expensive book about a pretty narrow
 subject, and the story could have been told almost as well in a less costly
 way. (No profit is being made by anybody but Lulu.com.) To anyone who
 really likes cave books, it's worth it.

 Lulu.com prints your copy on demand. The result in this case is sturdily
 bound in a printed hardcover. They also sell a number of other books on
 caves and caving. If you just search for caves you'll have to wade through
 scores of probably awful self-published novels. Besides Water Sinks, worthy
 of note are The Hollow Mountain: 1974-2006 by the Imperial College Caving
 Club (deep-cave exploration, printed paperback or free PDF, reviewed in
 March 2008 NSS News), Al Warild's Vertical (techniques manual, paperback,
 reviewed August 2002), and D. F. Machant's Life on a Line (rope rescue,
 paperback, reviewed June 2003).—Bill Mixon


 Please reply to mmin...@caver.net
 Permanent email address is mmin...@illinoisalumni.org

 --**--**-
 Visit our website: http://texascavers.com
 To unsubscribe, e-mail: 
 texascavers-unsubscribe@**texascavers.comtexascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com
 For additional commands, e-mail: 
 texascavers-help@texascavers.**comtexascavers-h...@texascavers.com

Re: [Texascavers] book review

[Mark Minton]

There is usually land available in that 
part of Virginia (Highland and Bath 
Counties).  Currently there is a 205-acre farm 
for sale near McDowell.  It's been on the market 
for a couple of years, so I suspect they're asking too much.


Mark

At 07:01 AM 7/30/2013, Ted Samsel wrote:
A few years ago (4?), there was land (with a 
house) available in the area for sale. When we 
were in Virginia, we considered looking at it.


Ted

On Mon, Jul 29, 2013 at 8:35 AM, Mark Minton mmin...@caver.net wrote:
I don't think a pdf version of Water Sinks is available.

Mark

At 12:34 AM 7/29/2013, Charles Goldsmith wrote:
Bill, is the author selling the pdf format anywhere?

On Sun, Jul 28, 2013 at 11:17 PM, Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com wrote:
I'm sure this won't raise a lot of interest, but...

Caves and Karst of the Water Sinks Area. Philip 
C. Lucas. Revised edition, 2012. 8.25 by 10.25 
inches, 369 pages, hardbound. $95.58 plus 
postage from lulu.com; search for Philip Lucas.


This is a great book. After I received the 
privately published book, I delayed reviewing 
it, hoping that the NSS would pick it up, but 
for some reason they passed. They could have 
published it with almost no effort and little 
risk and sold it for  good  bit less, if only to 
be of service to its members, but a large 
hardbound book with color illustrations 
throughout cannot be really inexpensive.


The book is the story of what happens when a 
caver with an engineering bent buys property in 
Virginia that contains small caves and potential 
digs. The result has been fifteen miles of cave 
with entrances on Lucas's property and that of a 
neighbor, including the Water Sinks system, 
Helictite Cave, and Wishing Well Cave. The 
exploration of these caves has been unusually 
well documented, both in trip reports and 
photographs. Besides maps and descriptions of 
the caves, the book contains reports on 
essentially all the digging or exploration 
trips, mostly written by Lucas. I actually found 
the trip reports much more interesting reading 
than the formal cave descriptions, as they give 
a better idea of the caves and the effort that 
went into finding and mapping them. The 
technical aspects are fascinating, especially 
the innovative ways of temporarily stabilizing 
breakdown and creating airflow to locate 
connections. Straws, however, are nowhere really described.
The editing by Nathan Farrar is excellent, and 
the design and layout, by Lucas and Farrar, are 
very well done. Some of the nearly six hundred 
color photographs could have used some color 
adjustment, but generally they illustrate the 
work and the caves very well. A special effort 
seems to have been made to include lots of clear 
photographs of the participants in the projects. 
(One of them would make a good hobbit.) 
Portraits on pages 101 and 104 are especially nice.


I can't deny that this is an expensive book 
about a pretty narrow subject, and the story 
could have been told almost as well in a less 
costly way. (No profit is being made by anybody 
but Lulu.com.) To anyone who really likes cave books, it's worth it.


Lulu.com prints your copy on demand. The result 
in this case is sturdily bound in a printed 
hardcover. They also sell a number of other 
books on caves and caving. If you just search 
for caves you'll have to wade through scores of 
probably awful self-published novels. Besides 
Water Sinks, worthy of note are The Hollow 
Mountain: 1974-2006 by the Imperial College 
Caving Club (deep-cave exploration, printed 
paperback or free PDF, reviewed in March 2008 
NSS News), Al Warild's Vertical (techniques 
manual, paperback, reviewed August 2002), and D. 
F. Machant's Life on a Line (rope rescue, 
paperback, reviewed June 2003).—Bill Mixon


Please reply to mmin...@caver.net
Permanent email address is mmin...@illinoisalumni.org 



-
Visit our website: http://texascavers.com
To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com
For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com

Re: [Texascavers] book review

[Ted Samsel]

A few years ago (4?), there was land (with a house) available in the area
for sale. When we were in Virginia, we considered looking at it.

Ted

On Mon, Jul 29, 2013 at 8:35 AM, Mark Minton mmin...@caver.net wrote:

 I don't think a pdf version of Water Sinks is available.

 Mark


 At 12:34 AM 7/29/2013, Charles Goldsmith wrote:

 Bill, is the author selling the pdf format anywhere?

 On Sun, Jul 28, 2013 at 11:17 PM, Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com
 wrote:
 I'm sure this won't raise a lot of interest, but...

 Caves and Karst of the Water Sinks Area. Philip C. Lucas. Revised
 edition, 2012. 8.25 by 10.25 inches, 369 pages, hardbound. $95.58 plus
 postage from lulu.com; search for Philip Lucas.

 This is a great book. After I received the privately published book, I
 delayed reviewing it, hoping that the NSS would pick it up, but for some
 reason they passed. They could have published it with almost no effort and
 little risk and sold it for  good  bit less, if only to be of service to
 its members, but a large hardbound book with color illustrations throughout
 cannot be really inexpensive.

 The book is the story of what happens when a caver with an engineering
 bent buys property in Virginia that contains small caves and potential
 digs. The result has been fifteen miles of cave with entrances on Lucas's
 property and that of a neighbor, including the Water Sinks system,
 Helictite Cave, and Wishing Well Cave. The exploration of these caves has
 been unusually well documented, both in trip reports and photographs.
 Besides maps and descriptions of the caves, the book contains reports on
 essentially all the digging or exploration trips, mostly written by Lucas.
 I actually found the trip reports much more interesting reading than the
 formal cave descriptions, as they give a better idea of the caves and the
 effort that went into finding and mapping them. The technical aspects are
 fascinating, especially the innovative ways of temporarily stabilizing
 breakdown and creating airflow to locate connections. Straws, however,
 are nowhere really described.
 The editing by Nathan Farrar is excellent, and the design and layout, by
 Lucas and Farrar, are very well done. Some of the nearly six hundred color
 photographs could have used some color adjustment, but generally they
 illustrate the work and the caves very well. A special effort seems to have
 been made to include lots of clear photographs of the participants in the
 projects. (One of them would make a good hobbit.) Portraits on pages 101
 and 104 are especially nice.

 I can't deny that this is an expensive book about a pretty narrow
 subject, and the story could have been told almost as well in a less costly
 way. (No profit is being made by anybody but Lulu.com.) To anyone who
 really likes cave books, it's worth it.

 Lulu.com prints your copy on demand. The result in this case is sturdily
 bound in a printed hardcover. They also sell a number of other books on
 caves and caving. If you just search for caves you'll have to wade through
 scores of probably awful self-published novels. Besides Water Sinks, worthy
 of note are The Hollow Mountain: 1974-2006 by the Imperial College Caving
 Club (deep-cave exploration, printed paperback or free PDF, reviewed in
 March 2008 NSS News), Al Warild's Vertical (techniques manual, paperback,
 reviewed August 2002), and D. F. Machant's Life on a Line (rope rescue,
 paperback, reviewed June 2003).—Bill Mixon


 Please reply to mmin...@caver.net
 Permanent email address is mmin...@illinoisalumni.org

 --**--**-
 Visit our website: http://texascavers.com
 To unsubscribe, e-mail: 
 texascavers-unsubscribe@**texascavers.comtexascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com
 For additional commands, e-mail: 
 texascavers-help@texascavers.**comtexascavers-h...@texascavers.com

Re: [Texascavers] book review

[Mark Minton]

There is usually land available in that 
part of Virginia (Highland and Bath 
Counties).  Currently there is a 205-acre farm 
for sale near McDowell.  It's been on the market 
for a couple of years, so I suspect they're asking too much.


Mark

At 07:01 AM 7/30/2013, Ted Samsel wrote:
A few years ago (4?), there was land (with a 
house) available in the area for sale. When we 
were in Virginia, we considered looking at it.


Ted

On Mon, Jul 29, 2013 at 8:35 AM, Mark Minton mmin...@caver.net wrote:
I don't think a pdf version of Water Sinks is available.

Mark

At 12:34 AM 7/29/2013, Charles Goldsmith wrote:
Bill, is the author selling the pdf format anywhere?

On Sun, Jul 28, 2013 at 11:17 PM, Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com wrote:
I'm sure this won't raise a lot of interest, but...

Caves and Karst of the Water Sinks Area. Philip 
C. Lucas. Revised edition, 2012. 8.25 by 10.25 
inches, 369 pages, hardbound. $95.58 plus 
postage from lulu.com; search for Philip Lucas.


This is a great book. After I received the 
privately published book, I delayed reviewing 
it, hoping that the NSS would pick it up, but 
for some reason they passed. They could have 
published it with almost no effort and little 
risk and sold it for  good  bit less, if only to 
be of service to its members, but a large 
hardbound book with color illustrations 
throughout cannot be really inexpensive.


The book is the story of what happens when a 
caver with an engineering bent buys property in 
Virginia that contains small caves and potential 
digs. The result has been fifteen miles of cave 
with entrances on Lucas's property and that of a 
neighbor, including the Water Sinks system, 
Helictite Cave, and Wishing Well Cave. The 
exploration of these caves has been unusually 
well documented, both in trip reports and 
photographs. Besides maps and descriptions of 
the caves, the book contains reports on 
essentially all the digging or exploration 
trips, mostly written by Lucas. I actually found 
the trip reports much more interesting reading 
than the formal cave descriptions, as they give 
a better idea of the caves and the effort that 
went into finding and mapping them. The 
technical aspects are fascinating, especially 
the innovative ways of temporarily stabilizing 
breakdown and creating airflow to locate 
connections. Straws, however, are nowhere really described.
The editing by Nathan Farrar is excellent, and 
the design and layout, by Lucas and Farrar, are 
very well done. Some of the nearly six hundred 
color photographs could have used some color 
adjustment, but generally they illustrate the 
work and the caves very well. A special effort 
seems to have been made to include lots of clear 
photographs of the participants in the projects. 
(One of them would make a good hobbit.) 
Portraits on pages 101 and 104 are especially nice.


I can't deny that this is an expensive book 
about a pretty narrow subject, and the story 
could have been told almost as well in a less 
costly way. (No profit is being made by anybody 
but Lulu.com.) To anyone who really likes cave books, it's worth it.


Lulu.com prints your copy on demand. The result 
in this case is sturdily bound in a printed 
hardcover. They also sell a number of other 
books on caves and caving. If you just search 
for caves you'll have to wade through scores of 
probably awful self-published novels. Besides 
Water Sinks, worthy of note are The Hollow 
Mountain: 1974-2006 by the Imperial College 
Caving Club (deep-cave exploration, printed 
paperback or free PDF, reviewed in March 2008 
NSS News), Al Warild's Vertical (techniques 
manual, paperback, reviewed August 2002), and D. 
F. Machant's Life on a Line (rope rescue, 
paperback, reviewed June 2003).—Bill Mixon


Please reply to mmin...@caver.net
Permanent email address is mmin...@illinoisalumni.org 



-
Visit our website: http://texascavers.com
To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com
For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com

Re: [Texascavers] book review

[Ted Samsel]

A few years ago (4?), there was land (with a house) available in the area
for sale. When we were in Virginia, we considered looking at it.

Ted

On Mon, Jul 29, 2013 at 8:35 AM, Mark Minton mmin...@caver.net wrote:

 I don't think a pdf version of Water Sinks is available.

 Mark


 At 12:34 AM 7/29/2013, Charles Goldsmith wrote:

 Bill, is the author selling the pdf format anywhere?

 On Sun, Jul 28, 2013 at 11:17 PM, Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com
 wrote:
 I'm sure this won't raise a lot of interest, but...

 Caves and Karst of the Water Sinks Area. Philip C. Lucas. Revised
 edition, 2012. 8.25 by 10.25 inches, 369 pages, hardbound. $95.58 plus
 postage from lulu.com; search for Philip Lucas.

 This is a great book. After I received the privately published book, I
 delayed reviewing it, hoping that the NSS would pick it up, but for some
 reason they passed. They could have published it with almost no effort and
 little risk and sold it for  good  bit less, if only to be of service to
 its members, but a large hardbound book with color illustrations throughout
 cannot be really inexpensive.

 The book is the story of what happens when a caver with an engineering
 bent buys property in Virginia that contains small caves and potential
 digs. The result has been fifteen miles of cave with entrances on Lucas's
 property and that of a neighbor, including the Water Sinks system,
 Helictite Cave, and Wishing Well Cave. The exploration of these caves has
 been unusually well documented, both in trip reports and photographs.
 Besides maps and descriptions of the caves, the book contains reports on
 essentially all the digging or exploration trips, mostly written by Lucas.
 I actually found the trip reports much more interesting reading than the
 formal cave descriptions, as they give a better idea of the caves and the
 effort that went into finding and mapping them. The technical aspects are
 fascinating, especially the innovative ways of temporarily stabilizing
 breakdown and creating airflow to locate connections. Straws, however,
 are nowhere really described.
 The editing by Nathan Farrar is excellent, and the design and layout, by
 Lucas and Farrar, are very well done. Some of the nearly six hundred color
 photographs could have used some color adjustment, but generally they
 illustrate the work and the caves very well. A special effort seems to have
 been made to include lots of clear photographs of the participants in the
 projects. (One of them would make a good hobbit.) Portraits on pages 101
 and 104 are especially nice.

 I can't deny that this is an expensive book about a pretty narrow
 subject, and the story could have been told almost as well in a less costly
 way. (No profit is being made by anybody but Lulu.com.) To anyone who
 really likes cave books, it's worth it.

 Lulu.com prints your copy on demand. The result in this case is sturdily
 bound in a printed hardcover. They also sell a number of other books on
 caves and caving. If you just search for caves you'll have to wade through
 scores of probably awful self-published novels. Besides Water Sinks, worthy
 of note are The Hollow Mountain: 1974-2006 by the Imperial College Caving
 Club (deep-cave exploration, printed paperback or free PDF, reviewed in
 March 2008 NSS News), Al Warild's Vertical (techniques manual, paperback,
 reviewed August 2002), and D. F. Machant's Life on a Line (rope rescue,
 paperback, reviewed June 2003).—Bill Mixon


 Please reply to mmin...@caver.net
 Permanent email address is mmin...@illinoisalumni.org

 --**--**-
 Visit our website: http://texascavers.com
 To unsubscribe, e-mail: 
 texascavers-unsubscribe@**texascavers.comtexascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com
 For additional commands, e-mail: 
 texascavers-help@texascavers.**comtexascavers-h...@texascavers.com

Re: [Texascavers] book review

[Mark Minton]

There is usually land available in that 
part of Virginia (Highland and Bath 
Counties).  Currently there is a 205-acre farm 
for sale near McDowell.  It's been on the market 
for a couple of years, so I suspect they're asking too much.


Mark

At 07:01 AM 7/30/2013, Ted Samsel wrote:
A few years ago (4?), there was land (with a 
house) available in the area for sale. When we 
were in Virginia, we considered looking at it.


Ted

On Mon, Jul 29, 2013 at 8:35 AM, Mark Minton mmin...@caver.net wrote:
I don't think a pdf version of Water Sinks is available.

Mark

At 12:34 AM 7/29/2013, Charles Goldsmith wrote:
Bill, is the author selling the pdf format anywhere?

On Sun, Jul 28, 2013 at 11:17 PM, Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com wrote:
I'm sure this won't raise a lot of interest, but...

Caves and Karst of the Water Sinks Area. Philip 
C. Lucas. Revised edition, 2012. 8.25 by 10.25 
inches, 369 pages, hardbound. $95.58 plus 
postage from lulu.com; search for Philip Lucas.


This is a great book. After I received the 
privately published book, I delayed reviewing 
it, hoping that the NSS would pick it up, but 
for some reason they passed. They could have 
published it with almost no effort and little 
risk and sold it for  good  bit less, if only to 
be of service to its members, but a large 
hardbound book with color illustrations 
throughout cannot be really inexpensive.


The book is the story of what happens when a 
caver with an engineering bent buys property in 
Virginia that contains small caves and potential 
digs. The result has been fifteen miles of cave 
with entrances on Lucas's property and that of a 
neighbor, including the Water Sinks system, 
Helictite Cave, and Wishing Well Cave. The 
exploration of these caves has been unusually 
well documented, both in trip reports and 
photographs. Besides maps and descriptions of 
the caves, the book contains reports on 
essentially all the digging or exploration 
trips, mostly written by Lucas. I actually found 
the trip reports much more interesting reading 
than the formal cave descriptions, as they give 
a better idea of the caves and the effort that 
went into finding and mapping them. The 
technical aspects are fascinating, especially 
the innovative ways of temporarily stabilizing 
breakdown and creating airflow to locate 
connections. Straws, however, are nowhere really described.
The editing by Nathan Farrar is excellent, and 
the design and layout, by Lucas and Farrar, are 
very well done. Some of the nearly six hundred 
color photographs could have used some color 
adjustment, but generally they illustrate the 
work and the caves very well. A special effort 
seems to have been made to include lots of clear 
photographs of the participants in the projects. 
(One of them would make a good hobbit.) 
Portraits on pages 101 and 104 are especially nice.


I can't deny that this is an expensive book 
about a pretty narrow subject, and the story 
could have been told almost as well in a less 
costly way. (No profit is being made by anybody 
but Lulu.com.) To anyone who really likes cave books, it's worth it.


Lulu.com prints your copy on demand. The result 
in this case is sturdily bound in a printed 
hardcover. They also sell a number of other 
books on caves and caving. If you just search 
for caves you'll have to wade through scores of 
probably awful self-published novels. Besides 
Water Sinks, worthy of note are The Hollow 
Mountain: 1974-2006 by the Imperial College 
Caving Club (deep-cave exploration, printed 
paperback or free PDF, reviewed in March 2008 
NSS News), Al Warild's Vertical (techniques 
manual, paperback, reviewed August 2002), and D. 
F. Machant's Life on a Line (rope rescue, 
paperback, reviewed June 2003).—Bill Mixon


Please reply to mmin...@caver.net
Permanent email address is mmin...@illinoisalumni.org 



-
Visit our website: http://texascavers.com
To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com
For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com

Re: [Texascavers] book review

[Mark Minton]

I don't think a pdf version of Water Sinks is available.

Mark

At 12:34 AM 7/29/2013, Charles Goldsmith wrote:

Bill, is the author selling the pdf format anywhere?

On Sun, Jul 28, 2013 at 11:17 PM, Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com wrote:
I'm sure this won't raise a lot of interest, but...

Caves and Karst of the Water Sinks Area. Philip 
C. Lucas. Revised edition, 2012. 8.25 by 10.25 
inches, 369 pages, hardbound. $95.58 plus 
postage from lulu.com; search for Philip Lucas.


This is a great book. After I received the 
privately published book, I delayed reviewing 
it, hoping that the NSS would pick it up, but 
for some reason they passed. They could have 
published it with almost no effort and little 
risk and sold it for  good  bit less, if only to 
be of service to its members, but a large 
hardbound book with color illustrations 
throughout cannot be really inexpensive.


The book is the story of what happens when a 
caver with an engineering bent buys property in 
Virginia that contains small caves and potential 
digs. The result has been fifteen miles of cave 
with entrances on Lucas's property and that of a 
neighbor, including the Water Sinks system, 
Helictite Cave, and Wishing Well Cave. The 
exploration of these caves has been unusually 
well documented, both in trip reports and 
photographs. Besides maps and descriptions of 
the caves, the book contains reports on 
essentially all the digging or exploration 
trips, mostly written by Lucas. I actually found 
the trip reports much more interesting reading 
than the formal cave descriptions, as they give 
a better idea of the caves and the effort that 
went into finding and mapping them. The 
technical aspects are fascinating, especially 
the innovative ways of temporarily stabilizing 
breakdown and creating airflow to locate 
connections. Straws, however, are nowhere really described.
The editing by Nathan Farrar is excellent, and 
the design and layout, by Lucas and Farrar, are 
very well done. Some of the nearly six hundred 
color photographs could have used some color 
adjustment, but generally they illustrate the 
work and the caves very well. A special effort 
seems to have been made to include lots of clear 
photographs of the participants in the projects. 
(One of them would make a good hobbit.) 
Portraits on pages 101 and 104 are especially nice.


I can't deny that this is an expensive book 
about a pretty narrow subject, and the story 
could have been told almost as well in a less 
costly way. (No profit is being made by anybody 
but Lulu.com.) To anyone who really likes cave books, it's worth it.


Lulu.com prints your copy on demand. The result 
in this case is sturdily bound in a printed 
hardcover. They also sell a number of other 
books on caves and caving. If you just search 
for caves you'll have to wade through scores of 
probably awful self-published novels. Besides 
Water Sinks, worthy of note are The Hollow 
Mountain: 1974-2006 by the Imperial College 
Caving Club (deep-cave exploration, printed 
paperback or free PDF, reviewed in March 2008 
NSS News), Al Warild's Vertical (techniques 
manual, paperback, reviewed August 2002), and D. 
F. Machant's Life on a Line (rope rescue, 
paperback, reviewed June 2003).—Bill Mixon


Please reply to mmin...@caver.net
Permanent email address is mmin...@illinoisalumni.org 



-
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Re: [Texascavers] book review

[Mixon Bill]

Charles -- No. I have suggested that to him; he could even put a free  
PDF on Lulu if they also sell paper copies (see The Hollow Mountain  
mentioned in my review). He isn't interested in making any money on  
the book, not even for the Virginia Speleological Survey. We've also  
tried to figure out other, cheaper sources. The NSS could have printed  
and sold some for $65, or less if softbound. I could have some printed  
by the AMCS's printer. I got a quote from them; forget what, something  
like $47 a copy. But Phil doesn't want the hassle of taking orders and  
mailing them himself.


When the opportunity arises, I'll again suggest putting a PDF  
somewhere. Would take just a little work to make a PDF that includes  
the covers; presumably Lulu has separate PDF files for the cover and  
the text pages. Author is Phil Lucas, lu...@virginiacaves.org, if you  
want to contact him.


The number of Mexican cave maps at amcs-pubs.org/maps has just passed  
3000. -- Bill


Today is the last day of your life so far.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: a...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org

Re: [Texascavers] book review

[Mark Minton]

I don't think a pdf version of Water Sinks is available.

Mark

At 12:34 AM 7/29/2013, Charles Goldsmith wrote:

Bill, is the author selling the pdf format anywhere?

On Sun, Jul 28, 2013 at 11:17 PM, Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com wrote:
I'm sure this won't raise a lot of interest, but...

Caves and Karst of the Water Sinks Area. Philip 
C. Lucas. Revised edition, 2012. 8.25 by 10.25 
inches, 369 pages, hardbound. $95.58 plus 
postage from lulu.com; search for Philip Lucas.


This is a great book. After I received the 
privately published book, I delayed reviewing 
it, hoping that the NSS would pick it up, but 
for some reason they passed. They could have 
published it with almost no effort and little 
risk and sold it for  good  bit less, if only to 
be of service to its members, but a large 
hardbound book with color illustrations 
throughout cannot be really inexpensive.


The book is the story of what happens when a 
caver with an engineering bent buys property in 
Virginia that contains small caves and potential 
digs. The result has been fifteen miles of cave 
with entrances on Lucas's property and that of a 
neighbor, including the Water Sinks system, 
Helictite Cave, and Wishing Well Cave. The 
exploration of these caves has been unusually 
well documented, both in trip reports and 
photographs. Besides maps and descriptions of 
the caves, the book contains reports on 
essentially all the digging or exploration 
trips, mostly written by Lucas. I actually found 
the trip reports much more interesting reading 
than the formal cave descriptions, as they give 
a better idea of the caves and the effort that 
went into finding and mapping them. The 
technical aspects are fascinating, especially 
the innovative ways of temporarily stabilizing 
breakdown and creating airflow to locate 
connections. Straws, however, are nowhere really described.
The editing by Nathan Farrar is excellent, and 
the design and layout, by Lucas and Farrar, are 
very well done. Some of the nearly six hundred 
color photographs could have used some color 
adjustment, but generally they illustrate the 
work and the caves very well. A special effort 
seems to have been made to include lots of clear 
photographs of the participants in the projects. 
(One of them would make a good hobbit.) 
Portraits on pages 101 and 104 are especially nice.


I can't deny that this is an expensive book 
about a pretty narrow subject, and the story 
could have been told almost as well in a less 
costly way. (No profit is being made by anybody 
but Lulu.com.) To anyone who really likes cave books, it's worth it.


Lulu.com prints your copy on demand. The result 
in this case is sturdily bound in a printed 
hardcover. They also sell a number of other 
books on caves and caving. If you just search 
for caves you'll have to wade through scores of 
probably awful self-published novels. Besides 
Water Sinks, worthy of note are The Hollow 
Mountain: 1974-2006 by the Imperial College 
Caving Club (deep-cave exploration, printed 
paperback or free PDF, reviewed in March 2008 
NSS News), Al Warild's Vertical (techniques 
manual, paperback, reviewed August 2002), and D. 
F. Machant's Life on a Line (rope rescue, 
paperback, reviewed June 2003).—Bill Mixon


Please reply to mmin...@caver.net
Permanent email address is mmin...@illinoisalumni.org 



-
Visit our website: http://texascavers.com
To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com
For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com

Re: [Texascavers] book review

[Mixon Bill]

Charles -- No. I have suggested that to him; he could even put a free  
PDF on Lulu if they also sell paper copies (see The Hollow Mountain  
mentioned in my review). He isn't interested in making any money on  
the book, not even for the Virginia Speleological Survey. We've also  
tried to figure out other, cheaper sources. The NSS could have printed  
and sold some for $65, or less if softbound. I could have some printed  
by the AMCS's printer. I got a quote from them; forget what, something  
like $47 a copy. But Phil doesn't want the hassle of taking orders and  
mailing them himself.


When the opportunity arises, I'll again suggest putting a PDF  
somewhere. Would take just a little work to make a PDF that includes  
the covers; presumably Lulu has separate PDF files for the cover and  
the text pages. Author is Phil Lucas, lu...@virginiacaves.org, if you  
want to contact him.


The number of Mexican cave maps at amcs-pubs.org/maps has just passed  
3000. -- Bill


Today is the last day of your life so far.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: a...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org

Re: [Texascavers] book review

[Mark Minton]

I don't think a pdf version of Water Sinks is available.

Mark

At 12:34 AM 7/29/2013, Charles Goldsmith wrote:

Bill, is the author selling the pdf format anywhere?

On Sun, Jul 28, 2013 at 11:17 PM, Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com wrote:
I'm sure this won't raise a lot of interest, but...

Caves and Karst of the Water Sinks Area. Philip 
C. Lucas. Revised edition, 2012. 8.25 by 10.25 
inches, 369 pages, hardbound. $95.58 plus 
postage from lulu.com; search for Philip Lucas.


This is a great book. After I received the 
privately published book, I delayed reviewing 
it, hoping that the NSS would pick it up, but 
for some reason they passed. They could have 
published it with almost no effort and little 
risk and sold it for  good  bit less, if only to 
be of service to its members, but a large 
hardbound book with color illustrations 
throughout cannot be really inexpensive.


The book is the story of what happens when a 
caver with an engineering bent buys property in 
Virginia that contains small caves and potential 
digs. The result has been fifteen miles of cave 
with entrances on Lucas's property and that of a 
neighbor, including the Water Sinks system, 
Helictite Cave, and Wishing Well Cave. The 
exploration of these caves has been unusually 
well documented, both in trip reports and 
photographs. Besides maps and descriptions of 
the caves, the book contains reports on 
essentially all the digging or exploration 
trips, mostly written by Lucas. I actually found 
the trip reports much more interesting reading 
than the formal cave descriptions, as they give 
a better idea of the caves and the effort that 
went into finding and mapping them. The 
technical aspects are fascinating, especially 
the innovative ways of temporarily stabilizing 
breakdown and creating airflow to locate 
connections. Straws, however, are nowhere really described.
The editing by Nathan Farrar is excellent, and 
the design and layout, by Lucas and Farrar, are 
very well done. Some of the nearly six hundred 
color photographs could have used some color 
adjustment, but generally they illustrate the 
work and the caves very well. A special effort 
seems to have been made to include lots of clear 
photographs of the participants in the projects. 
(One of them would make a good hobbit.) 
Portraits on pages 101 and 104 are especially nice.


I can't deny that this is an expensive book 
about a pretty narrow subject, and the story 
could have been told almost as well in a less 
costly way. (No profit is being made by anybody 
but Lulu.com.) To anyone who really likes cave books, it's worth it.


Lulu.com prints your copy on demand. The result 
in this case is sturdily bound in a printed 
hardcover. They also sell a number of other 
books on caves and caving. If you just search 
for caves you'll have to wade through scores of 
probably awful self-published novels. Besides 
Water Sinks, worthy of note are The Hollow 
Mountain: 1974-2006 by the Imperial College 
Caving Club (deep-cave exploration, printed 
paperback or free PDF, reviewed in March 2008 
NSS News), Al Warild's Vertical (techniques 
manual, paperback, reviewed August 2002), and D. 
F. Machant's Life on a Line (rope rescue, 
paperback, reviewed June 2003).—Bill Mixon


Please reply to mmin...@caver.net
Permanent email address is mmin...@illinoisalumni.org 



-
Visit our website: http://texascavers.com
To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com
For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com

Re: [Texascavers] book review

[Mixon Bill]

Charles -- No. I have suggested that to him; he could even put a free  
PDF on Lulu if they also sell paper copies (see The Hollow Mountain  
mentioned in my review). He isn't interested in making any money on  
the book, not even for the Virginia Speleological Survey. We've also  
tried to figure out other, cheaper sources. The NSS could have printed  
and sold some for $65, or less if softbound. I could have some printed  
by the AMCS's printer. I got a quote from them; forget what, something  
like $47 a copy. But Phil doesn't want the hassle of taking orders and  
mailing them himself.


When the opportunity arises, I'll again suggest putting a PDF  
somewhere. Would take just a little work to make a PDF that includes  
the covers; presumably Lulu has separate PDF files for the cover and  
the text pages. Author is Phil Lucas, lu...@virginiacaves.org, if you  
want to contact him.


The number of Mexican cave maps at amcs-pubs.org/maps has just passed  
3000. -- Bill


Today is the last day of your life so far.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: a...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org

[Texascavers] book review

[Mixon Bill]

I'm sure this won't raise a lot of interest, but...

Caves and Karst of the Water Sinks Area. Philip C. Lucas. Revised  
edition, 2012. 8.25 by 10.25 inches, 369 pages, hardbound. $95.58 plus  
postage from lulu.com; search for Philip Lucas.


This is a great book. After I received the privately published book, I  
delayed reviewing it, hoping that the NSS would pick it up, but for  
some reason they passed. They could have published it with almost no  
effort and little risk and sold it for  good  bit less, if only to be  
of service to its members, but a large hardbound book with color  
illustrations throughout cannot be really inexpensive.


The book is the story of what happens when a caver with an engineering  
bent buys property in Virginia that contains small caves and potential  
digs. The result has been fifteen miles of cave with entrances on  
Lucas's property and that of a neighbor, including the Water Sinks  
system, Helictite Cave, and Wishing Well Cave. The exploration of  
these caves has been unusually well documented, both in trip reports  
and photographs. Besides maps and descriptions of the caves, the book  
contains reports on essentially all the digging or exploration trips,  
mostly written by Lucas. I actually found the trip reports much more  
interesting reading than the formal cave descriptions, as they give a  
better idea of the caves and the effort that went into finding and  
mapping them. The technical aspects are fascinating, especially the  
innovative ways of temporarily stabilizing breakdown and creating  
airflow to locate connections. Straws, however, are nowhere really  
described.
The editing by Nathan Farrar is excellent, and the design and layout,  
by Lucas and Farrar, are very well done. Some of the nearly six  
hundred color photographs could have used some color adjustment, but  
generally they illustrate the work and the caves very well. A special  
effort seems to have been made to include lots of clear photographs of  
the participants in the projects. (One of them would make a good  
hobbit.) Portraits on pages 101 and 104 are especially nice.


I can't deny that this is an expensive book about a pretty narrow  
subject, and the story could have been told almost as well in a less  
costly way. (No profit is being made by anybody but Lulu.com.) To  
anyone who really likes cave books, it's worth it.


Lulu.com prints your copy on demand. The result in this case is  
sturdily bound in a printed hardcover. They also sell a number of  
other books on caves and caving. If you just search for caves you'll  
have to wade through scores of probably awful self-published novels.  
Besides Water Sinks, worthy of note are The Hollow Mountain: 1974–2006  
by the Imperial College Caving Club (deep-cave exploration, printed  
paperback or free PDF, reviewed in March 2008 NSS News), Al Warild's  
Vertical (techniques manual, paperback, reviewed August 2002), and D.  
F. Machant's Life on a Line (rope rescue, paperback, reviewed June  
2003).—Bill Mixon


Today is the last day of your life so far.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: a...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


-
Visit our website: http://texascavers.com
To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com
For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com

Re: [Texascavers] book review

[Charles Goldsmith]

Bill, is the author selling the pdf format anywhere?


On Sun, Jul 28, 2013 at 11:17 PM, Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.comwrote:

 I'm sure this won't raise a lot of interest, but...

 Caves and Karst of the Water Sinks Area. Philip C. Lucas. Revised edition,
 2012. 8.25 by 10.25 inches, 369 pages, hardbound. $95.58 plus postage from
 lulu.com; search for Philip Lucas.

 This is a great book. After I received the privately published book, I
 delayed reviewing it, hoping that the NSS would pick it up, but for some
 reason they passed. They could have published it with almost no effort and
 little risk and sold it for  good  bit less, if only to be of service to
 its members, but a large hardbound book with color illustrations throughout
 cannot be really inexpensive.

 The book is the story of what happens when a caver with an engineering
 bent buys property in Virginia that contains small caves and potential
 digs. The result has been fifteen miles of cave with entrances on Lucas's
 property and that of a neighbor, including the Water Sinks system,
 Helictite Cave, and Wishing Well Cave. The exploration of these caves has
 been unusually well documented, both in trip reports and photographs.
 Besides maps and descriptions of the caves, the book contains reports on
 essentially all the digging or exploration trips, mostly written by Lucas.
 I actually found the trip reports much more interesting reading than the
 formal cave descriptions, as they give a better idea of the caves and the
 effort that went into finding and mapping them. The technical aspects are
 fascinating, especially the innovative ways of temporarily stabilizing
 breakdown and creating airflow to locate connections. Straws, however,
 are nowhere really described.
 The editing by Nathan Farrar is excellent, and the design and layout, by
 Lucas and Farrar, are very well done. Some of the nearly six hundred color
 photographs could have used some color adjustment, but generally they
 illustrate the work and the caves very well. A special effort seems to have
 been made to include lots of clear photographs of the participants in the
 projects. (One of them would make a good hobbit.) Portraits on pages 101
 and 104 are especially nice.

 I can't deny that this is an expensive book about a pretty narrow subject,
 and the story could have been told almost as well in a less costly way. (No
 profit is being made by anybody but Lulu.com.) To anyone who really likes
 cave books, it's worth it.

 Lulu.com prints your copy on demand. The result in this case is sturdily
 bound in a printed hardcover. They also sell a number of other books on
 caves and caving. If you just search for caves you'll have to wade through
 scores of probably awful self-published novels. Besides Water Sinks, worthy
 of note are The Hollow Mountain: 1974–2006 by the Imperial College Caving
 Club (deep-cave exploration, printed paperback or free PDF, reviewed in
 March 2008 NSS News), Al Warild's Vertical (techniques manual, paperback,
 reviewed August 2002), and D. F. Machant's Life on a Line (rope rescue,
 paperback, reviewed June 2003).—Bill Mixon
 --**--
 Today is the last day of your life so far.
 --**--
 You may reply to the address this message
 came from, but for long-term use, save:
 Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
 AMCS: a...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


 --**--**-
 Visit our website: http://texascavers.com
 To unsubscribe, e-mail: 
 texascavers-unsubscribe@**texascavers.comtexascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com
 For additional commands, e-mail: 
 texascavers-help@texascavers.**comtexascavers-h...@texascavers.com

[Texascavers] book review

[Mixon Bill]

I'm sure this won't raise a lot of interest, but...

Caves and Karst of the Water Sinks Area. Philip C. Lucas. Revised  
edition, 2012. 8.25 by 10.25 inches, 369 pages, hardbound. $95.58 plus  
postage from lulu.com; search for Philip Lucas.


This is a great book. After I received the privately published book, I  
delayed reviewing it, hoping that the NSS would pick it up, but for  
some reason they passed. They could have published it with almost no  
effort and little risk and sold it for  good  bit less, if only to be  
of service to its members, but a large hardbound book with color  
illustrations throughout cannot be really inexpensive.


The book is the story of what happens when a caver with an engineering  
bent buys property in Virginia that contains small caves and potential  
digs. The result has been fifteen miles of cave with entrances on  
Lucas's property and that of a neighbor, including the Water Sinks  
system, Helictite Cave, and Wishing Well Cave. The exploration of  
these caves has been unusually well documented, both in trip reports  
and photographs. Besides maps and descriptions of the caves, the book  
contains reports on essentially all the digging or exploration trips,  
mostly written by Lucas. I actually found the trip reports much more  
interesting reading than the formal cave descriptions, as they give a  
better idea of the caves and the effort that went into finding and  
mapping them. The technical aspects are fascinating, especially the  
innovative ways of temporarily stabilizing breakdown and creating  
airflow to locate connections. Straws, however, are nowhere really  
described.
The editing by Nathan Farrar is excellent, and the design and layout,  
by Lucas and Farrar, are very well done. Some of the nearly six  
hundred color photographs could have used some color adjustment, but  
generally they illustrate the work and the caves very well. A special  
effort seems to have been made to include lots of clear photographs of  
the participants in the projects. (One of them would make a good  
hobbit.) Portraits on pages 101 and 104 are especially nice.


I can't deny that this is an expensive book about a pretty narrow  
subject, and the story could have been told almost as well in a less  
costly way. (No profit is being made by anybody but Lulu.com.) To  
anyone who really likes cave books, it's worth it.


Lulu.com prints your copy on demand. The result in this case is  
sturdily bound in a printed hardcover. They also sell a number of  
other books on caves and caving. If you just search for caves you'll  
have to wade through scores of probably awful self-published novels.  
Besides Water Sinks, worthy of note are The Hollow Mountain: 1974–2006  
by the Imperial College Caving Club (deep-cave exploration, printed  
paperback or free PDF, reviewed in March 2008 NSS News), Al Warild's  
Vertical (techniques manual, paperback, reviewed August 2002), and D.  
F. Machant's Life on a Line (rope rescue, paperback, reviewed June  
2003).—Bill Mixon


Today is the last day of your life so far.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: a...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


-
Visit our website: http://texascavers.com
To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com
For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com

Re: [Texascavers] book review

[Charles Goldsmith]

Bill, is the author selling the pdf format anywhere?


On Sun, Jul 28, 2013 at 11:17 PM, Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.comwrote:

 I'm sure this won't raise a lot of interest, but...

 Caves and Karst of the Water Sinks Area. Philip C. Lucas. Revised edition,
 2012. 8.25 by 10.25 inches, 369 pages, hardbound. $95.58 plus postage from
 lulu.com; search for Philip Lucas.

 This is a great book. After I received the privately published book, I
 delayed reviewing it, hoping that the NSS would pick it up, but for some
 reason they passed. They could have published it with almost no effort and
 little risk and sold it for  good  bit less, if only to be of service to
 its members, but a large hardbound book with color illustrations throughout
 cannot be really inexpensive.

 The book is the story of what happens when a caver with an engineering
 bent buys property in Virginia that contains small caves and potential
 digs. The result has been fifteen miles of cave with entrances on Lucas's
 property and that of a neighbor, including the Water Sinks system,
 Helictite Cave, and Wishing Well Cave. The exploration of these caves has
 been unusually well documented, both in trip reports and photographs.
 Besides maps and descriptions of the caves, the book contains reports on
 essentially all the digging or exploration trips, mostly written by Lucas.
 I actually found the trip reports much more interesting reading than the
 formal cave descriptions, as they give a better idea of the caves and the
 effort that went into finding and mapping them. The technical aspects are
 fascinating, especially the innovative ways of temporarily stabilizing
 breakdown and creating airflow to locate connections. Straws, however,
 are nowhere really described.
 The editing by Nathan Farrar is excellent, and the design and layout, by
 Lucas and Farrar, are very well done. Some of the nearly six hundred color
 photographs could have used some color adjustment, but generally they
 illustrate the work and the caves very well. A special effort seems to have
 been made to include lots of clear photographs of the participants in the
 projects. (One of them would make a good hobbit.) Portraits on pages 101
 and 104 are especially nice.

 I can't deny that this is an expensive book about a pretty narrow subject,
 and the story could have been told almost as well in a less costly way. (No
 profit is being made by anybody but Lulu.com.) To anyone who really likes
 cave books, it's worth it.

 Lulu.com prints your copy on demand. The result in this case is sturdily
 bound in a printed hardcover. They also sell a number of other books on
 caves and caving. If you just search for caves you'll have to wade through
 scores of probably awful self-published novels. Besides Water Sinks, worthy
 of note are The Hollow Mountain: 1974–2006 by the Imperial College Caving
 Club (deep-cave exploration, printed paperback or free PDF, reviewed in
 March 2008 NSS News), Al Warild's Vertical (techniques manual, paperback,
 reviewed August 2002), and D. F. Machant's Life on a Line (rope rescue,
 paperback, reviewed June 2003).—Bill Mixon
 --**--
 Today is the last day of your life so far.
 --**--
 You may reply to the address this message
 came from, but for long-term use, save:
 Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
 AMCS: a...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


 --**--**-
 Visit our website: http://texascavers.com
 To unsubscribe, e-mail: 
 texascavers-unsubscribe@**texascavers.comtexascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com
 For additional commands, e-mail: 
 texascavers-help@texascavers.**comtexascavers-h...@texascavers.com

[Texascavers] book review

[Mixon Bill]

I'm sure this won't raise a lot of interest, but...

Caves and Karst of the Water Sinks Area. Philip C. Lucas. Revised  
edition, 2012. 8.25 by 10.25 inches, 369 pages, hardbound. $95.58 plus  
postage from lulu.com; search for Philip Lucas.


This is a great book. After I received the privately published book, I  
delayed reviewing it, hoping that the NSS would pick it up, but for  
some reason they passed. They could have published it with almost no  
effort and little risk and sold it for  good  bit less, if only to be  
of service to its members, but a large hardbound book with color  
illustrations throughout cannot be really inexpensive.


The book is the story of what happens when a caver with an engineering  
bent buys property in Virginia that contains small caves and potential  
digs. The result has been fifteen miles of cave with entrances on  
Lucas's property and that of a neighbor, including the Water Sinks  
system, Helictite Cave, and Wishing Well Cave. The exploration of  
these caves has been unusually well documented, both in trip reports  
and photographs. Besides maps and descriptions of the caves, the book  
contains reports on essentially all the digging or exploration trips,  
mostly written by Lucas. I actually found the trip reports much more  
interesting reading than the formal cave descriptions, as they give a  
better idea of the caves and the effort that went into finding and  
mapping them. The technical aspects are fascinating, especially the  
innovative ways of temporarily stabilizing breakdown and creating  
airflow to locate connections. Straws, however, are nowhere really  
described.
The editing by Nathan Farrar is excellent, and the design and layout,  
by Lucas and Farrar, are very well done. Some of the nearly six  
hundred color photographs could have used some color adjustment, but  
generally they illustrate the work and the caves very well. A special  
effort seems to have been made to include lots of clear photographs of  
the participants in the projects. (One of them would make a good  
hobbit.) Portraits on pages 101 and 104 are especially nice.


I can't deny that this is an expensive book about a pretty narrow  
subject, and the story could have been told almost as well in a less  
costly way. (No profit is being made by anybody but Lulu.com.) To  
anyone who really likes cave books, it's worth it.


Lulu.com prints your copy on demand. The result in this case is  
sturdily bound in a printed hardcover. They also sell a number of  
other books on caves and caving. If you just search for caves you'll  
have to wade through scores of probably awful self-published novels.  
Besides Water Sinks, worthy of note are The Hollow Mountain: 1974–2006  
by the Imperial College Caving Club (deep-cave exploration, printed  
paperback or free PDF, reviewed in March 2008 NSS News), Al Warild's  
Vertical (techniques manual, paperback, reviewed August 2002), and D.  
F. Machant's Life on a Line (rope rescue, paperback, reviewed June  
2003).—Bill Mixon


Today is the last day of your life so far.

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[Texascavers] book review: caves of the Venezuelan tapuis

[Mixon Bill]

Venezuelan Tapuis: Their Caves and Biota. Edited by Roman Aubrecht  
and Ján Schlögl. Comenius University, Bratislava; 2012. ISBN  
978-80-223-3349-8. 8 by 11 inches, 167 pages. Free PDF file at http://www.academia.edu/3462814/Venezuelan_tepui_-_their_caves_and_biota 
.


The tapuis of Venezuela are isolated mesas of Precambrian quartzite  
and sandstone with spectacular scenery, including 807-meter Angel  
Falls, the world's highest waterfall. They also contains some large  
and unusual karst features, including huge shafts such as Sima Major  
on Sarisariñama Tepui, 300 meters wide and deep, and the Ojos de  
Cristal Cave System, 16 kilometers long. The helicopters sitting on  
the floor of the 200-meter-high entrance to Cueva El Fantasma in  
figure 13 look like flies. Quartzite is not very soluble, so the caves  
have been assumed to be very old, but no speleothems have been dated  
to before the Pleistocene. Ten feet of rain a year no doubt has  
something to do with their formation.


Fifteen authors have contributed to this book. It is very much a  
scientific monograph, but even the most technical sections have many  
color photographs of unusual surface and underground features.  
Following a brief introduction to the geology and climate of the area,  
there is a hundred-page geology chapter. The part of that of most  
general interest is a survey of many of the caves known on the tapuis,  
although the only maps are small-scale outline maps. Other sections  
cover water chemistry and curious speleothems of unusual composition,  
such as silica. Geomicrobiology is apparently involved in the creation  
of some of the formations. The final chapter, on biota, is about  
thirty-eight pages long and covers only land snails, aquatic insects  
both surface and cave, and herps. The bibliography is fourteen pages  
of fine print.


To download the PDF file (30 MB with compressed illustrations), you'll  
need to sign up for something called academia.edu. It is free. I don't  
know yet how much of a nuisance belonging to it will be; presumably  
there's some more or, probably, less obvious way to cancel your  
registration. If you are the sort of person who belongs to Facebook  
downloading may be easier. The color photographs are a very important  
part of the book, but it will be expensive to print out if you want to  
make a color hardcopy. If you do print it, note that the PDF file does  
not contain the blank back of the cover, so the left-hand pages all  
appear on the right. Before making a two-sided printout, add the blank  
page or delete the cover page.—Bill Mixon


God created the world in six days. On the seventh day, while God  
rested, the Devil created religion.


You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
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[Texascavers] book review: caves of the Venezuelan tapuis

[Mixon Bill]

Venezuelan Tapuis: Their Caves and Biota. Edited by Roman Aubrecht  
and Ján Schlögl. Comenius University, Bratislava; 2012. ISBN  
978-80-223-3349-8. 8 by 11 inches, 167 pages. Free PDF file at http://www.academia.edu/3462814/Venezuelan_tepui_-_their_caves_and_biota 
.


The tapuis of Venezuela are isolated mesas of Precambrian quartzite  
and sandstone with spectacular scenery, including 807-meter Angel  
Falls, the world's highest waterfall. They also contains some large  
and unusual karst features, including huge shafts such as Sima Major  
on Sarisariñama Tepui, 300 meters wide and deep, and the Ojos de  
Cristal Cave System, 16 kilometers long. The helicopters sitting on  
the floor of the 200-meter-high entrance to Cueva El Fantasma in  
figure 13 look like flies. Quartzite is not very soluble, so the caves  
have been assumed to be very old, but no speleothems have been dated  
to before the Pleistocene. Ten feet of rain a year no doubt has  
something to do with their formation.


Fifteen authors have contributed to this book. It is very much a  
scientific monograph, but even the most technical sections have many  
color photographs of unusual surface and underground features.  
Following a brief introduction to the geology and climate of the area,  
there is a hundred-page geology chapter. The part of that of most  
general interest is a survey of many of the caves known on the tapuis,  
although the only maps are small-scale outline maps. Other sections  
cover water chemistry and curious speleothems of unusual composition,  
such as silica. Geomicrobiology is apparently involved in the creation  
of some of the formations. The final chapter, on biota, is about  
thirty-eight pages long and covers only land snails, aquatic insects  
both surface and cave, and herps. The bibliography is fourteen pages  
of fine print.


To download the PDF file (30 MB with compressed illustrations), you'll  
need to sign up for something called academia.edu. It is free. I don't  
know yet how much of a nuisance belonging to it will be; presumably  
there's some more or, probably, less obvious way to cancel your  
registration. If you are the sort of person who belongs to Facebook  
downloading may be easier. The color photographs are a very important  
part of the book, but it will be expensive to print out if you want to  
make a color hardcopy. If you do print it, note that the PDF file does  
not contain the blank back of the cover, so the left-hand pages all  
appear on the right. Before making a two-sided printout, add the blank  
page or delete the cover page.—Bill Mixon


God created the world in six days. On the seventh day, while God  
rested, the Devil created religion.


You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: a...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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[Texascavers] book review: caves of the Venezuelan tapuis

[Mixon Bill]

Venezuelan Tapuis: Their Caves and Biota. Edited by Roman Aubrecht  
and Ján Schlögl. Comenius University, Bratislava; 2012. ISBN  
978-80-223-3349-8. 8 by 11 inches, 167 pages. Free PDF file at http://www.academia.edu/3462814/Venezuelan_tepui_-_their_caves_and_biota 
.


The tapuis of Venezuela are isolated mesas of Precambrian quartzite  
and sandstone with spectacular scenery, including 807-meter Angel  
Falls, the world's highest waterfall. They also contains some large  
and unusual karst features, including huge shafts such as Sima Major  
on Sarisariñama Tepui, 300 meters wide and deep, and the Ojos de  
Cristal Cave System, 16 kilometers long. The helicopters sitting on  
the floor of the 200-meter-high entrance to Cueva El Fantasma in  
figure 13 look like flies. Quartzite is not very soluble, so the caves  
have been assumed to be very old, but no speleothems have been dated  
to before the Pleistocene. Ten feet of rain a year no doubt has  
something to do with their formation.


Fifteen authors have contributed to this book. It is very much a  
scientific monograph, but even the most technical sections have many  
color photographs of unusual surface and underground features.  
Following a brief introduction to the geology and climate of the area,  
there is a hundred-page geology chapter. The part of that of most  
general interest is a survey of many of the caves known on the tapuis,  
although the only maps are small-scale outline maps. Other sections  
cover water chemistry and curious speleothems of unusual composition,  
such as silica. Geomicrobiology is apparently involved in the creation  
of some of the formations. The final chapter, on biota, is about  
thirty-eight pages long and covers only land snails, aquatic insects  
both surface and cave, and herps. The bibliography is fourteen pages  
of fine print.


To download the PDF file (30 MB with compressed illustrations), you'll  
need to sign up for something called academia.edu. It is free. I don't  
know yet how much of a nuisance belonging to it will be; presumably  
there's some more or, probably, less obvious way to cancel your  
registration. If you are the sort of person who belongs to Facebook  
downloading may be easier. The color photographs are a very important  
part of the book, but it will be expensive to print out if you want to  
make a color hardcopy. If you do print it, note that the PDF file does  
not contain the blank back of the cover, so the left-hand pages all  
appear on the right. Before making a two-sided printout, add the blank  
page or delete the cover page.—Bill Mixon


God created the world in six days. On the seventh day, while God  
rested, the Devil created religion.


You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: a...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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[Texascavers] book review, Yorkshire Dales

[Mixon Bill]

Caves and Karst of the Yorkshire Dales. Volume 1. Edited by Tony  
Waltham and David Lowe. British Cave Research Association; 2013. A4  
size, 255 pages. Softbound ISBN 978-0-900265-46-4, £25; hardbound ISBN  
978-0-900265-47-1, £70. Add £6.25 for surface post to the U.S.


This book continues a long tradition of comprehensive reviews of cave  
and karst areas in Great Britain, including the Limestones and Caves  
series on the Mendip Hills (1975), the Peak District (1977), Wales  
(1989), and northwest England (1974), the last of which, published  
nearly forty years ago, is updated by this important new book. I can't  
think of any comparable volume for a part of the United States,  
although some NSS convention guidebooks are similar in intent, if not  
execution. The area covered is roughly the southern half of the  
Yorkshire Dales National Park. (In Britain, national parks are about  
controlling development, not public ownership or access.) It is the  
most important caving area in the country, with over 500 kilometers of  
surveyed caves, including the 102-kilometer Three Counties System.  
Glaciers and, more recently, sheep have scoured the hills, exposing  
surface karst such as spectacular examples of limestone pavements.  
Most streams have underground segments, and the barren surface causes  
rapid runoff, creating dangerous floods in many of the caves.


A nice introductory chapter is followed by five chapters (106 pages)  
on the bedrock and surface geology of the area, with emphasis on the  
effects of glaciation and karst processes. Then there are five  
chapters (70 pages) on cave geomorphology and hydrogeology and on  
speleothem dating and paleoclimate analysis. Archaeology,  
paleontology, and surface and cave biology get only a total of 65  
pages; this is primarily a geology book. Each chapter has an extensive  
bibliography, and there is an index of locations mentioned in the  
text, with map coordinates. Every page except those entirely occupied  
by reference lists has one or more well-chosen color photos or  
diagrams. Many of the diagrams are clear; others are complicated and  
require some study. The layout, by the editors, is fully professional.


While the subject of the book is a small area of about a thousand  
square kilometers, a lot of the material in the book is of course  
relevant to many other areas, and a reader can learn a lot from parts  
of the book even if he has no particular interest in the Yorkshire  
Dales. Chapters 4 on surface karst geomorphology and 7 on cave  
geomorphology are especially instructive, and the chapters on  
speleothem studies provide good reviews. The chapter on cave life,  
however, is just a local catalog, and the overly long chapter on  
glacial history of the area has limited application to karst  
elsewhere, although a reader will learn plenty, and then some, about  
the effects of glaciers on landscapes.


Volume 2 is going to describe in detail many of the most important  
cave systems in the area. It will be published in pieces as e-books  
during late 2013 and 2014 and then, after all the parts are completed,  
as a paper book. Considering that this large book is just volume 1, it  
certainly serves as a challenging model for what could be done for  
areas in the U.S., although few, if any, have been studied as  
extensively as the Yorkshire Dales in England.


Credit-card orders may be placed at bcra.org.uk/bookshop. The prices,  
including surface postage, translate to a bit less than $50 and $120  
for the softbound and hardbound, respectively. That may seem high, but  
consider that the university presses at Oxford or Cambridge would have  
added another hundred pounds. Those who see this review in time to  
order by June 30 may pay the introductory price of £20 or £56, plus  
shipping.

—Bill Mixon

Rules to live by: Don't, and don't forget to.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: a...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com

[Texascavers] book review, Yorkshire Dales

[Mixon Bill]

Caves and Karst of the Yorkshire Dales. Volume 1. Edited by Tony  
Waltham and David Lowe. British Cave Research Association; 2013. A4  
size, 255 pages. Softbound ISBN 978-0-900265-46-4, £25; hardbound ISBN  
978-0-900265-47-1, £70. Add £6.25 for surface post to the U.S.


This book continues a long tradition of comprehensive reviews of cave  
and karst areas in Great Britain, including the Limestones and Caves  
series on the Mendip Hills (1975), the Peak District (1977), Wales  
(1989), and northwest England (1974), the last of which, published  
nearly forty years ago, is updated by this important new book. I can't  
think of any comparable volume for a part of the United States,  
although some NSS convention guidebooks are similar in intent, if not  
execution. The area covered is roughly the southern half of the  
Yorkshire Dales National Park. (In Britain, national parks are about  
controlling development, not public ownership or access.) It is the  
most important caving area in the country, with over 500 kilometers of  
surveyed caves, including the 102-kilometer Three Counties System.  
Glaciers and, more recently, sheep have scoured the hills, exposing  
surface karst such as spectacular examples of limestone pavements.  
Most streams have underground segments, and the barren surface causes  
rapid runoff, creating dangerous floods in many of the caves.


A nice introductory chapter is followed by five chapters (106 pages)  
on the bedrock and surface geology of the area, with emphasis on the  
effects of glaciation and karst processes. Then there are five  
chapters (70 pages) on cave geomorphology and hydrogeology and on  
speleothem dating and paleoclimate analysis. Archaeology,  
paleontology, and surface and cave biology get only a total of 65  
pages; this is primarily a geology book. Each chapter has an extensive  
bibliography, and there is an index of locations mentioned in the  
text, with map coordinates. Every page except those entirely occupied  
by reference lists has one or more well-chosen color photos or  
diagrams. Many of the diagrams are clear; others are complicated and  
require some study. The layout, by the editors, is fully professional.


While the subject of the book is a small area of about a thousand  
square kilometers, a lot of the material in the book is of course  
relevant to many other areas, and a reader can learn a lot from parts  
of the book even if he has no particular interest in the Yorkshire  
Dales. Chapters 4 on surface karst geomorphology and 7 on cave  
geomorphology are especially instructive, and the chapters on  
speleothem studies provide good reviews. The chapter on cave life,  
however, is just a local catalog, and the overly long chapter on  
glacial history of the area has limited application to karst  
elsewhere, although a reader will learn plenty, and then some, about  
the effects of glaciers on landscapes.


Volume 2 is going to describe in detail many of the most important  
cave systems in the area. It will be published in pieces as e-books  
during late 2013 and 2014 and then, after all the parts are completed,  
as a paper book. Considering that this large book is just volume 1, it  
certainly serves as a challenging model for what could be done for  
areas in the U.S., although few, if any, have been studied as  
extensively as the Yorkshire Dales in England.


Credit-card orders may be placed at bcra.org.uk/bookshop. The prices,  
including surface postage, translate to a bit less than $50 and $120  
for the softbound and hardbound, respectively. That may seem high, but  
consider that the university presses at Oxford or Cambridge would have  
added another hundred pounds. Those who see this review in time to  
order by June 30 may pay the introductory price of £20 or £56, plus  
shipping.

—Bill Mixon

Rules to live by: Don't, and don't forget to.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: a...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


-
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To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com
For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com

[Texascavers] book review, Yorkshire Dales

[Mixon Bill]

Caves and Karst of the Yorkshire Dales. Volume 1. Edited by Tony  
Waltham and David Lowe. British Cave Research Association; 2013. A4  
size, 255 pages. Softbound ISBN 978-0-900265-46-4, £25; hardbound ISBN  
978-0-900265-47-1, £70. Add £6.25 for surface post to the U.S.


This book continues a long tradition of comprehensive reviews of cave  
and karst areas in Great Britain, including the Limestones and Caves  
series on the Mendip Hills (1975), the Peak District (1977), Wales  
(1989), and northwest England (1974), the last of which, published  
nearly forty years ago, is updated by this important new book. I can't  
think of any comparable volume for a part of the United States,  
although some NSS convention guidebooks are similar in intent, if not  
execution. The area covered is roughly the southern half of the  
Yorkshire Dales National Park. (In Britain, national parks are about  
controlling development, not public ownership or access.) It is the  
most important caving area in the country, with over 500 kilometers of  
surveyed caves, including the 102-kilometer Three Counties System.  
Glaciers and, more recently, sheep have scoured the hills, exposing  
surface karst such as spectacular examples of limestone pavements.  
Most streams have underground segments, and the barren surface causes  
rapid runoff, creating dangerous floods in many of the caves.


A nice introductory chapter is followed by five chapters (106 pages)  
on the bedrock and surface geology of the area, with emphasis on the  
effects of glaciation and karst processes. Then there are five  
chapters (70 pages) on cave geomorphology and hydrogeology and on  
speleothem dating and paleoclimate analysis. Archaeology,  
paleontology, and surface and cave biology get only a total of 65  
pages; this is primarily a geology book. Each chapter has an extensive  
bibliography, and there is an index of locations mentioned in the  
text, with map coordinates. Every page except those entirely occupied  
by reference lists has one or more well-chosen color photos or  
diagrams. Many of the diagrams are clear; others are complicated and  
require some study. The layout, by the editors, is fully professional.


While the subject of the book is a small area of about a thousand  
square kilometers, a lot of the material in the book is of course  
relevant to many other areas, and a reader can learn a lot from parts  
of the book even if he has no particular interest in the Yorkshire  
Dales. Chapters 4 on surface karst geomorphology and 7 on cave  
geomorphology are especially instructive, and the chapters on  
speleothem studies provide good reviews. The chapter on cave life,  
however, is just a local catalog, and the overly long chapter on  
glacial history of the area has limited application to karst  
elsewhere, although a reader will learn plenty, and then some, about  
the effects of glaciers on landscapes.


Volume 2 is going to describe in detail many of the most important  
cave systems in the area. It will be published in pieces as e-books  
during late 2013 and 2014 and then, after all the parts are completed,  
as a paper book. Considering that this large book is just volume 1, it  
certainly serves as a challenging model for what could be done for  
areas in the U.S., although few, if any, have been studied as  
extensively as the Yorkshire Dales in England.


Credit-card orders may be placed at bcra.org.uk/bookshop. The prices,  
including surface postage, translate to a bit less than $50 and $120  
for the softbound and hardbound, respectively. That may seem high, but  
consider that the university presses at Oxford or Cambridge would have  
added another hundred pounds. Those who see this review in time to  
order by June 30 may pay the introductory price of £20 or £56, plus  
shipping.

—Bill Mixon

Rules to live by: Don't, and don't forget to.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: a...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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[Texascavers] book review: On the Desert's Edge

[Mixon Bill]

On the Desert's Edge: A Journey of 36 Years In and Around the  
Guadalupe Mountains, New Mexico and Texas. Dale Pate and Ronal Kerbo.  
Flat Rock Publishing, Littleton, Colorado; 2013. ISBN  
978-0-9891184-0-8. 8.5 by 11 inches, 79 pages, softbound. $24.95.


Pate and Kerbo, both in turn cave specialists at Carlsbad Caverns  
National Park, have created this very nice book of short essays,  
poems, and color photographs inspired by the Guads, both above and  
below ground. I had an opportunity to comment on a draft of this book  
in September 2011; it has changed little, and it didn't need to. The  
authors' love and respect for the canyons and caves comes through  
clearly. There are photographs on almost every page, mostly in color  
and all but three taken by one of the authors.  It is hard to  
characterize the book in a word. As sort of a mash-up of arts, it will  
probably serve mainly as a fine gift for a caver or someone else  
interested in the outdoors.—Bill Mixon


Rules to live by: Don't, and don't forget to.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
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[Texascavers] book review: On the Desert's Edge

[Mixon Bill]

On the Desert's Edge: A Journey of 36 Years In and Around the  
Guadalupe Mountains, New Mexico and Texas. Dale Pate and Ronal Kerbo.  
Flat Rock Publishing, Littleton, Colorado; 2013. ISBN  
978-0-9891184-0-8. 8.5 by 11 inches, 79 pages, softbound. $24.95.


Pate and Kerbo, both in turn cave specialists at Carlsbad Caverns  
National Park, have created this very nice book of short essays,  
poems, and color photographs inspired by the Guads, both above and  
below ground. I had an opportunity to comment on a draft of this book  
in September 2011; it has changed little, and it didn't need to. The  
authors' love and respect for the canyons and caves comes through  
clearly. There are photographs on almost every page, mostly in color  
and all but three taken by one of the authors.  It is hard to  
characterize the book in a word. As sort of a mash-up of arts, it will  
probably serve mainly as a fine gift for a caver or someone else  
interested in the outdoors.—Bill Mixon


Rules to live by: Don't, and don't forget to.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: a...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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[Texascavers] book review: Caves and Karst of West Virginia

[Mixon Bill]

The Caves and Karst of West Virginia. George Dasher. West Virginia  
Speleological Survey, Barrackville; 2012. ISBN 5800081-93389-2. 8.5 by  
11 inches, 264 pages, softbound. $25 postpaid from PO Box 200,  
Barrackville, West Virginia 26559.


This is rather a grab bag. The largest part is Dasher's survey of the  
caves and karst of West Virginia (92 pages, including a 6-page  
bibliography). This is dry, verging on unreadable; I suggest dipping  
into it as a reference, guided by the index. It is heavily illustrated  
with black-and-white photos, maps, and diagrams. There is an eleven- 
page article by Craig Stihler on cave bats in West Virginia; this is  
the same article that appears in the 2012 NSS convention guidebook. An  
article on Pleistocene vertebrate paleontology (5 pages) is by Ray  
Garton and Fred Grady. There are thirty-seven pages of tables: long  
caves, deep caves, significant caves, cave accidents, etc. Appendixes  
include reprints of the geology field-trip guides from the 2000 and  
2012 NSS convention guidebooks (28 and 43 pages, respectively).
Aside from the fact that the illustrations are poorly prepared and  
crudely printed, the book is nicely laid out. It is perfect-bound in a  
color cover; the photo on the back cover is especially nice.—Bill Mixon


True friends stab you in the front.

You may reply to the address this message
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[Texascavers] book review: Caves and Karst of West Virginia

[Mixon Bill]

The Caves and Karst of West Virginia. George Dasher. West Virginia  
Speleological Survey, Barrackville; 2012. ISBN 5800081-93389-2. 8.5 by  
11 inches, 264 pages, softbound. $25 postpaid from PO Box 200,  
Barrackville, West Virginia 26559.


This is rather a grab bag. The largest part is Dasher's survey of the  
caves and karst of West Virginia (92 pages, including a 6-page  
bibliography). This is dry, verging on unreadable; I suggest dipping  
into it as a reference, guided by the index. It is heavily illustrated  
with black-and-white photos, maps, and diagrams. There is an eleven- 
page article by Craig Stihler on cave bats in West Virginia; this is  
the same article that appears in the 2012 NSS convention guidebook. An  
article on Pleistocene vertebrate paleontology (5 pages) is by Ray  
Garton and Fred Grady. There are thirty-seven pages of tables: long  
caves, deep caves, significant caves, cave accidents, etc. Appendixes  
include reprints of the geology field-trip guides from the 2000 and  
2012 NSS convention guidebooks (28 and 43 pages, respectively).
Aside from the fact that the illustrations are poorly prepared and  
crudely printed, the book is nicely laid out. It is perfect-bound in a  
color cover; the photo on the back cover is especially nice.—Bill Mixon


True friends stab you in the front.

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[Texascavers] book review: Caves and Karst of West Virginia

[Mixon Bill]

The Caves and Karst of West Virginia. George Dasher. West Virginia  
Speleological Survey, Barrackville; 2012. ISBN 5800081-93389-2. 8.5 by  
11 inches, 264 pages, softbound. $25 postpaid from PO Box 200,  
Barrackville, West Virginia 26559.


This is rather a grab bag. The largest part is Dasher's survey of the  
caves and karst of West Virginia (92 pages, including a 6-page  
bibliography). This is dry, verging on unreadable; I suggest dipping  
into it as a reference, guided by the index. It is heavily illustrated  
with black-and-white photos, maps, and diagrams. There is an eleven- 
page article by Craig Stihler on cave bats in West Virginia; this is  
the same article that appears in the 2012 NSS convention guidebook. An  
article on Pleistocene vertebrate paleontology (5 pages) is by Ray  
Garton and Fred Grady. There are thirty-seven pages of tables: long  
caves, deep caves, significant caves, cave accidents, etc. Appendixes  
include reprints of the geology field-trip guides from the 2000 and  
2012 NSS convention guidebooks (28 and 43 pages, respectively).
Aside from the fact that the illustrations are poorly prepared and  
crudely printed, the book is nicely laid out. It is perfect-bound in a  
color cover; the photo on the back cover is especially nice.—Bill Mixon


True friends stab you in the front.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
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[Texascavers] book review: Catawba Murder Hole

[Mixon Bill]

Murder Hole: Catawba Murder Hole Cave. Marian McConnell. National  
Speleological Society, Huntsville, 2012. ISBN 978-1-879961-46-3. 8.5  
by 11 inches, 150 pages, softbound. $24 (discounts for NSS members).


Catawba Murder Hole is one of the better known wild caves in Virginia,  
perhaps partly because of its memorable name. It is not large, but  
goes fairly deep, including one drop that requires a rope and others  
that are often rigged. Marian and Don McConnell bought the property in  
1993, and Marian has gathered a lot of information about its history.  
Some of the legends recounted here involve murders, but there's no  
real evidence for them. There have been quite a few accidents and  
rescues from the cave over the years, because it was both well known  
locally and popular with cavers. Most of the accident reports in the  
book are poorly written newspaper accounts that might well have been  
summarized, accompanied by photographs so poorly reproduced that the  
book would have been better off without them; perhaps they were taken  
from microfilm records. But there is an interesting and authoritative  
account of a fatal accident caused by chemical damage to a manila  
rope. Four pages are wasted on an accident in a different cave,  
included on a flimsy pretext.


A long section describes other visits to the cave over the years. The  
oldest reference McConnell could find to the cave is its appearance  
on a historical map of the county as it was in about 1800, but  
actually the map was made in 1965. A long and interesting article by  
Porte Crayon (pseudonym) about being lowered into a cave in 1834 is  
included, but again this was a different cave entirely. Apparently a  
lot of the material about local visitors was gotten by planting an  
article in the local paper and asking to hear from people who had  
visited it. This fetched a number of interesting accounts and a lot  
that aren't interesting, such as the bare fact that somebody named  
Gene Ferguson says he went into the cave in 1948 or 1949. There are a  
lot of old and not so old black-and-white photos in this section.  
There must be a lot of reports in grotto newsletters about visits to  
this cave, and if they had been mined selectively this section might  
have been a lot more interesting.


There is a very detailed plan of the cave, but the profile, which is  
much more interesting from the sporting and accident point of view, is  
represented only by two sketches. A narrative trip through the cave  
clarifies some of the mysteries earlier in the book, but it is  
apparently written for sixth-graders. I wonder whether the McConnells  
really guide groups that young through their cave. The book includes  
chapters on safety and conservation that won't be important for most  
buyers, but might be good to have if Scouts and similar groups visit  
the cave. All in all, I'd say about half of the content is worth the  
space.


In common with all the recent books prepared for printing by the NSS  
Special Publications Committee, the design of the book is annoying,  
with gigantic type in columns too narrow to accommodate it gracefully,  
especially next to photos printed needlessly large. In addition, the  
actual layout of this book, from the redundant title on, was extremely  
careless. Apparently the NSS sells at a profit anything it prints, but  
that doesn't mean it should print just anything.—Bill Mixon


I believe there are
15,747,724,136,275,002,577,605,653,961,
181,555,468,044,717,914,527,116,709,366,
231,425,076,185,631,031,296 protons in the
universe and the same number of electrons.
—Sir Arthur Eddington
If you must know, that's 17 x 2^259.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: a...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


-
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[Texascavers] book review: Catawba Murder Hole

[Mixon Bill]

Murder Hole: Catawba Murder Hole Cave. Marian McConnell. National  
Speleological Society, Huntsville, 2012. ISBN 978-1-879961-46-3. 8.5  
by 11 inches, 150 pages, softbound. $24 (discounts for NSS members).


Catawba Murder Hole is one of the better known wild caves in Virginia,  
perhaps partly because of its memorable name. It is not large, but  
goes fairly deep, including one drop that requires a rope and others  
that are often rigged. Marian and Don McConnell bought the property in  
1993, and Marian has gathered a lot of information about its history.  
Some of the legends recounted here involve murders, but there's no  
real evidence for them. There have been quite a few accidents and  
rescues from the cave over the years, because it was both well known  
locally and popular with cavers. Most of the accident reports in the  
book are poorly written newspaper accounts that might well have been  
summarized, accompanied by photographs so poorly reproduced that the  
book would have been better off without them; perhaps they were taken  
from microfilm records. But there is an interesting and authoritative  
account of a fatal accident caused by chemical damage to a manila  
rope. Four pages are wasted on an accident in a different cave,  
included on a flimsy pretext.


A long section describes other visits to the cave over the years. The  
oldest reference McConnell could find to the cave is its appearance  
on a historical map of the county as it was in about 1800, but  
actually the map was made in 1965. A long and interesting article by  
Porte Crayon (pseudonym) about being lowered into a cave in 1834 is  
included, but again this was a different cave entirely. Apparently a  
lot of the material about local visitors was gotten by planting an  
article in the local paper and asking to hear from people who had  
visited it. This fetched a number of interesting accounts and a lot  
that aren't interesting, such as the bare fact that somebody named  
Gene Ferguson says he went into the cave in 1948 or 1949. There are a  
lot of old and not so old black-and-white photos in this section.  
There must be a lot of reports in grotto newsletters about visits to  
this cave, and if they had been mined selectively this section might  
have been a lot more interesting.


There is a very detailed plan of the cave, but the profile, which is  
much more interesting from the sporting and accident point of view, is  
represented only by two sketches. A narrative trip through the cave  
clarifies some of the mysteries earlier in the book, but it is  
apparently written for sixth-graders. I wonder whether the McConnells  
really guide groups that young through their cave. The book includes  
chapters on safety and conservation that won't be important for most  
buyers, but might be good to have if Scouts and similar groups visit  
the cave. All in all, I'd say about half of the content is worth the  
space.


In common with all the recent books prepared for printing by the NSS  
Special Publications Committee, the design of the book is annoying,  
with gigantic type in columns too narrow to accommodate it gracefully,  
especially next to photos printed needlessly large. In addition, the  
actual layout of this book, from the redundant title on, was extremely  
careless. Apparently the NSS sells at a profit anything it prints, but  
that doesn't mean it should print just anything.—Bill Mixon


I believe there are
15,747,724,136,275,002,577,605,653,961,
181,555,468,044,717,914,527,116,709,366,
231,425,076,185,631,031,296 protons in the
universe and the same number of electrons.
—Sir Arthur Eddington
If you must know, that's 17 x 2^259.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: a...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


-
Visit our website: http://texascavers.com
To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com
For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com

[Texascavers] book review: Catawba Murder Hole

[Mixon Bill]

Murder Hole: Catawba Murder Hole Cave. Marian McConnell. National  
Speleological Society, Huntsville, 2012. ISBN 978-1-879961-46-3. 8.5  
by 11 inches, 150 pages, softbound. $24 (discounts for NSS members).


Catawba Murder Hole is one of the better known wild caves in Virginia,  
perhaps partly because of its memorable name. It is not large, but  
goes fairly deep, including one drop that requires a rope and others  
that are often rigged. Marian and Don McConnell bought the property in  
1993, and Marian has gathered a lot of information about its history.  
Some of the legends recounted here involve murders, but there's no  
real evidence for them. There have been quite a few accidents and  
rescues from the cave over the years, because it was both well known  
locally and popular with cavers. Most of the accident reports in the  
book are poorly written newspaper accounts that might well have been  
summarized, accompanied by photographs so poorly reproduced that the  
book would have been better off without them; perhaps they were taken  
from microfilm records. But there is an interesting and authoritative  
account of a fatal accident caused by chemical damage to a manila  
rope. Four pages are wasted on an accident in a different cave,  
included on a flimsy pretext.


A long section describes other visits to the cave over the years. The  
oldest reference McConnell could find to the cave is its appearance  
on a historical map of the county as it was in about 1800, but  
actually the map was made in 1965. A long and interesting article by  
Porte Crayon (pseudonym) about being lowered into a cave in 1834 is  
included, but again this was a different cave entirely. Apparently a  
lot of the material about local visitors was gotten by planting an  
article in the local paper and asking to hear from people who had  
visited it. This fetched a number of interesting accounts and a lot  
that aren't interesting, such as the bare fact that somebody named  
Gene Ferguson says he went into the cave in 1948 or 1949. There are a  
lot of old and not so old black-and-white photos in this section.  
There must be a lot of reports in grotto newsletters about visits to  
this cave, and if they had been mined selectively this section might  
have been a lot more interesting.


There is a very detailed plan of the cave, but the profile, which is  
much more interesting from the sporting and accident point of view, is  
represented only by two sketches. A narrative trip through the cave  
clarifies some of the mysteries earlier in the book, but it is  
apparently written for sixth-graders. I wonder whether the McConnells  
really guide groups that young through their cave. The book includes  
chapters on safety and conservation that won't be important for most  
buyers, but might be good to have if Scouts and similar groups visit  
the cave. All in all, I'd say about half of the content is worth the  
space.


In common with all the recent books prepared for printing by the NSS  
Special Publications Committee, the design of the book is annoying,  
with gigantic type in columns too narrow to accommodate it gracefully,  
especially next to photos printed needlessly large. In addition, the  
actual layout of this book, from the redundant title on, was extremely  
careless. Apparently the NSS sells at a profit anything it prints, but  
that doesn't mean it should print just anything.—Bill Mixon


I believe there are
15,747,724,136,275,002,577,605,653,961,
181,555,468,044,717,914,527,116,709,366,
231,425,076,185,631,031,296 protons in the
universe and the same number of electrons.
—Sir Arthur Eddington
If you must know, that's 17 x 2^259.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: a...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


-
Visit our website: http://texascavers.com
To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com
For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com

[Texascavers] Book Review

[R D Milhollin]

UNDERGROUND IN ARABIA John Pint

 2012, Selwa Press  978-0-97011-575-1  $12.95 PB

(from Saudi Aramco World Sep/Oct 2012)

What happens when an American English teacher finds his way into Saudi 
Arabia's underground? This is the story John Pint tells in a witty, engaging 
and thoroughly entertaining record of his caving adventures during working 
stints in the kingdom beginning in 1981. Pint originally traded teaching and 
(caving) in France for a job at what is now King Fahd University of Petroleum 
and Minerals in Dhahran and resumed his hobby almost immediately. Soon, he and 
fellow explorers landed a big find near Ma'aqala, north of Riyadh, in an area 
rich with dahls, a term that means a natural pit that... might provide access 
to water, Pint notes. Exploration revealed natural formations like stalactites 
and gypsum flowers, previously undocumented in Saudi caves. This was just the 
beginning of Pint's quarter-century of spelunking in the kingdom, his finds 
enthralling and paving the way for academics to study a beautiful world beneath 
Saudi Arabia's often-forbidding
 surface.
-Caitlin Clark

Re: [Texascavers] Book Review

[Andy Gluesenkamp]

I received a copy of this book as a gift (family friends with the publisher).  
Pint's highly descriptive writing style and humorous, down-to-earth view of the 
world makes this book a fun read.  The caves he describes are simply amazing 
and he makes it clear throughout that there is much, much more yet to be 
discovered under the sands.

 
Andrew G. Gluesenkamp, Ph.D.
700 Billie Brooks Drive
Driftwood, Texas 78619
(512) 799-1095
a...@gluesenkamp.com



 From: R D Milhollin rdmilhol...@yahoo.com
To: Texascavers List texascavers@texascavers.com 
Sent: Thursday, November 15, 2012 1:51 PM
Subject: [Texascavers] Book Review
 

UNDERGROUND IN ARABIA John Pint

 2012, Selwa Press  978-0-97011-575-1  $12.95 PB

(from Saudi Aramco World Sep/Oct 2012)

What happens when an American English teacher finds his way into Saudi 
Arabia's underground? This is the story John Pint tells in a witty, engaging 
and thoroughly entertaining record of his caving adventures during working 
stints in the kingdom beginning in 1981. Pint originally traded teaching and 
(caving) in France for a job at what is now King Fahd University of Petroleum 
and Minerals in Dhahran and resumed his hobby almost immediately. Soon, he and 
fellow explorers landed a big find near Ma'aqala, north of Riyadh, in an area 
rich with dahls, a term that means a natural pit that... might provide access 
to water, Pint notes. Exploration revealed natural formations like stalactites 
and gypsum flowers, previously undocumented in Saudi caves. This was just the 
beginning of Pint's quarter-century of spelunking in the kingdom, his finds 
enthralling and paving the way for academics to study a beautiful world beneath 
Saudi Arabia's often-forbidding
 surface.
-Caitlin Clark

[Texascavers] Book Review

[R D Milhollin]

UNDERGROUND IN ARABIA John Pint

 2012, Selwa Press  978-0-97011-575-1  $12.95 PB

(from Saudi Aramco World Sep/Oct 2012)

What happens when an American English teacher finds his way into Saudi 
Arabia's underground? This is the story John Pint tells in a witty, engaging 
and thoroughly entertaining record of his caving adventures during working 
stints in the kingdom beginning in 1981. Pint originally traded teaching and 
(caving) in France for a job at what is now King Fahd University of Petroleum 
and Minerals in Dhahran and resumed his hobby almost immediately. Soon, he and 
fellow explorers landed a big find near Ma'aqala, north of Riyadh, in an area 
rich with dahls, a term that means a natural pit that... might provide access 
to water, Pint notes. Exploration revealed natural formations like stalactites 
and gypsum flowers, previously undocumented in Saudi caves. This was just the 
beginning of Pint's quarter-century of spelunking in the kingdom, his finds 
enthralling and paving the way for academics to study a beautiful world beneath 
Saudi Arabia's often-forbidding
 surface.
-Caitlin Clark

Re: [Texascavers] Book Review

[Andy Gluesenkamp]

I received a copy of this book as a gift (family friends with the publisher).  
Pint's highly descriptive writing style and humorous, down-to-earth view of the 
world makes this book a fun read.  The caves he describes are simply amazing 
and he makes it clear throughout that there is much, much more yet to be 
discovered under the sands.

 
Andrew G. Gluesenkamp, Ph.D.
700 Billie Brooks Drive
Driftwood, Texas 78619
(512) 799-1095
a...@gluesenkamp.com



 From: R D Milhollin rdmilhol...@yahoo.com
To: Texascavers List texascavers@texascavers.com 
Sent: Thursday, November 15, 2012 1:51 PM
Subject: [Texascavers] Book Review
 

UNDERGROUND IN ARABIA John Pint

 2012, Selwa Press  978-0-97011-575-1  $12.95 PB

(from Saudi Aramco World Sep/Oct 2012)

What happens when an American English teacher finds his way into Saudi 
Arabia's underground? This is the story John Pint tells in a witty, engaging 
and thoroughly entertaining record of his caving adventures during working 
stints in the kingdom beginning in 1981. Pint originally traded teaching and 
(caving) in France for a job at what is now King Fahd University of Petroleum 
and Minerals in Dhahran and resumed his hobby almost immediately. Soon, he and 
fellow explorers landed a big find near Ma'aqala, north of Riyadh, in an area 
rich with dahls, a term that means a natural pit that... might provide access 
to water, Pint notes. Exploration revealed natural formations like stalactites 
and gypsum flowers, previously undocumented in Saudi caves. This was just the 
beginning of Pint's quarter-century of spelunking in the kingdom, his finds 
enthralling and paving the way for academics to study a beautiful world beneath 
Saudi Arabia's often-forbidding
 surface.
-Caitlin Clark

[Texascavers] book review: underground in Arabia

[Mixon Bill]

Underground in Arabia. John Pint. Selwa Press; 2012. ISBN  
978-097011525-1. 5 by 8 inches, 150 pages. Softbound $14.95 according  
to the bar code, but $12.95 according to Amazon; Kindle edition $4.99.


A nice little book of tales about the author's adventures exploring  
caves in Saudi Arabia, both well-decorated limestone caves and large  
lava tubes with lots of archaeological and paleontological potential.  
It is clear that there is a lot more to be discovered underground in  
Arabia, but the logistics and officialdom would likely be difficult.  
Much of Pint's work was done while he was a consultant to the Saudi  
Geological Survey. Local guides are essential, and the interactions  
with the locals make for at least as interesting reading as the caving.


The book is clearly meant to be just an entertaining read, which it  
is. There are no index, no bibliography, no cave maps, and only  
scattered small black-and-white photographs.  For a very nice coffee- 
table book of color photographs, see Pint's The Desert Caves of Saudi  
Arabia, ISBN 1-900988-48-8, still in the Amazon catalog for only a bit  
more than twice the price of this new book. An extensive bibliography  
is at www.saudicaves.com. The same web site also has a long list of  
links to trip reports from the country.—Bill Mixon


Forgive your enemies . . . after they are hanged.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
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[Texascavers] book review: underground in Arabia

[Mixon Bill]

Underground in Arabia. John Pint. Selwa Press; 2012. ISBN  
978-097011525-1. 5 by 8 inches, 150 pages. Softbound $14.95 according  
to the bar code, but $12.95 according to Amazon; Kindle edition $4.99.


A nice little book of tales about the author's adventures exploring  
caves in Saudi Arabia, both well-decorated limestone caves and large  
lava tubes with lots of archaeological and paleontological potential.  
It is clear that there is a lot more to be discovered underground in  
Arabia, but the logistics and officialdom would likely be difficult.  
Much of Pint's work was done while he was a consultant to the Saudi  
Geological Survey. Local guides are essential, and the interactions  
with the locals make for at least as interesting reading as the caving.


The book is clearly meant to be just an entertaining read, which it  
is. There are no index, no bibliography, no cave maps, and only  
scattered small black-and-white photographs.  For a very nice coffee- 
table book of color photographs, see Pint's The Desert Caves of Saudi  
Arabia, ISBN 1-900988-48-8, still in the Amazon catalog for only a bit  
more than twice the price of this new book. An extensive bibliography  
is at www.saudicaves.com. The same web site also has a long list of  
links to trip reports from the country.—Bill Mixon


Forgive your enemies . . . after they are hanged.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: edi...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


-
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For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com

[Texascavers] book review: underground in Arabia

[Mixon Bill]

Underground in Arabia. John Pint. Selwa Press; 2012. ISBN  
978-097011525-1. 5 by 8 inches, 150 pages. Softbound $14.95 according  
to the bar code, but $12.95 according to Amazon; Kindle edition $4.99.


A nice little book of tales about the author's adventures exploring  
caves in Saudi Arabia, both well-decorated limestone caves and large  
lava tubes with lots of archaeological and paleontological potential.  
It is clear that there is a lot more to be discovered underground in  
Arabia, but the logistics and officialdom would likely be difficult.  
Much of Pint's work was done while he was a consultant to the Saudi  
Geological Survey. Local guides are essential, and the interactions  
with the locals make for at least as interesting reading as the caving.


The book is clearly meant to be just an entertaining read, which it  
is. There are no index, no bibliography, no cave maps, and only  
scattered small black-and-white photographs.  For a very nice coffee- 
table book of color photographs, see Pint's The Desert Caves of Saudi  
Arabia, ISBN 1-900988-48-8, still in the Amazon catalog for only a bit  
more than twice the price of this new book. An extensive bibliography  
is at www.saudicaves.com. The same web site also has a long list of  
links to trip reports from the country.—Bill Mixon


Forgive your enemies . . . after they are hanged.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: edi...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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[Texascavers] book review: MAR bulletin 22

[Mixon Bill]

Karst of Sinking Valley and Kooken Cave, Huntingdon and Blair  
Counties. Edited by William B. White. Mid-Appalachian Region Bulletin  
21; 2012. 8.5 by 11 inches, 103 pages plus map plates, softbound.  
$27.50 plus shipping (NSS members only); see www.caves.org/region/mar/pubs.htm 
.


This is the first MAR bulletin since 1996, and most of the others are  
county surveys. This new bulletin is an in-depth study of two major  
(for Pennsylvania) caves and the geology and hydrology of their area.  
Kooken Cave is 9035 feet long and 244 feet deep, and its history goes  
back to the 1930s, when two entrances were dug in hopes of finding a  
cave with commercial potential. The horizontal Tytoona–Arch Spring  
Cave System has a much longer history because of its large and  
conspicuous entrances, and it has been an NSS cave preserve since  
1997. A past attempt to commercialize it, probably doomed in any case,  
failed because a flood destroyed improvements. It would provide a  
through-trip of almost five thousand feet, but with four sump dives. A  
map of Tytoona is on three foldouts, and a map of Kooken Cave is on  
two large, loose folded sheets, undesirable because of their tendency  
to stray, but justified by the amount of detail. There is much that is  
still unknown about the hydrogeology of Sinking Valley, and there is  
potential for the discovery of additional large caves.

--Bill Mixon

Forgive your enemies . . . after they are hanged.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
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[Texascavers] book review: MAR bulletin 22

[Mixon Bill]

Karst of Sinking Valley and Kooken Cave, Huntingdon and Blair  
Counties. Edited by William B. White. Mid-Appalachian Region Bulletin  
21; 2012. 8.5 by 11 inches, 103 pages plus map plates, softbound.  
$27.50 plus shipping (NSS members only); see www.caves.org/region/mar/pubs.htm 
.


This is the first MAR bulletin since 1996, and most of the others are  
county surveys. This new bulletin is an in-depth study of two major  
(for Pennsylvania) caves and the geology and hydrology of their area.  
Kooken Cave is 9035 feet long and 244 feet deep, and its history goes  
back to the 1930s, when two entrances were dug in hopes of finding a  
cave with commercial potential. The horizontal Tytoona–Arch Spring  
Cave System has a much longer history because of its large and  
conspicuous entrances, and it has been an NSS cave preserve since  
1997. A past attempt to commercialize it, probably doomed in any case,  
failed because a flood destroyed improvements. It would provide a  
through-trip of almost five thousand feet, but with four sump dives. A  
map of Tytoona is on three foldouts, and a map of Kooken Cave is on  
two large, loose folded sheets, undesirable because of their tendency  
to stray, but justified by the amount of detail. There is much that is  
still unknown about the hydrogeology of Sinking Valley, and there is  
potential for the discovery of additional large caves.

--Bill Mixon

Forgive your enemies . . . after they are hanged.

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[Texascavers] book review: MAR bulletin 22

[Mixon Bill]

Karst of Sinking Valley and Kooken Cave, Huntingdon and Blair  
Counties. Edited by William B. White. Mid-Appalachian Region Bulletin  
21; 2012. 8.5 by 11 inches, 103 pages plus map plates, softbound.  
$27.50 plus shipping (NSS members only); see www.caves.org/region/mar/pubs.htm 
.


This is the first MAR bulletin since 1996, and most of the others are  
county surveys. This new bulletin is an in-depth study of two major  
(for Pennsylvania) caves and the geology and hydrology of their area.  
Kooken Cave is 9035 feet long and 244 feet deep, and its history goes  
back to the 1930s, when two entrances were dug in hopes of finding a  
cave with commercial potential. The horizontal Tytoona–Arch Spring  
Cave System has a much longer history because of its large and  
conspicuous entrances, and it has been an NSS cave preserve since  
1997. A past attempt to commercialize it, probably doomed in any case,  
failed because a flood destroyed improvements. It would provide a  
through-trip of almost five thousand feet, but with four sump dives. A  
map of Tytoona is on three foldouts, and a map of Kooken Cave is on  
two large, loose folded sheets, undesirable because of their tendency  
to stray, but justified by the amount of detail. There is much that is  
still unknown about the hydrogeology of Sinking Valley, and there is  
potential for the discovery of additional large caves.

--Bill Mixon

Forgive your enemies . . . after they are hanged.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: edi...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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[Texascavers] book review: Cave File of the Virginias

[Mixon Bill]

Cave Life of the Virginias: A Field Guide to Commonly Encountered  
Species. Daniel W. Fong, Megan L. Porter, and Michael E. Slay.  
Biology Section of the National Speleological Society; 2012. 5 by 8.5  
inches, 42 pages, spiral bound. $16 plus shipping from NSS Bookstore  
or Speleobooks.


This is the first of a proposed Cave Life Series on cave regions in  
the United States. Between a brief introduction and a nice  
bibliography, the book consists of one or two pages on each major type  
of cave critter one is likely to see in Virginia or West Virginia. For  
obligate cave species (troglobionts and stygobionts), there are  
distribution maps of the various species. There is a color photograph  
of a representative of each type, such as isopod or amphipod. The book  
is nicely printed on paper thickly laminated to be waterproof and  
maybe bulletproof. With the plastic spiral binding, it could serve as  
a field guide, but I'm not sure what use it would be in the field,  
unless you can't tell an pseudoscorpion from a cave cricket. Unlike a  
bird guide, it doesn't illustrate all the species it discusses, so it  
won't help distinguish, for example, among the seven species of  
asellid isopods in the genus Caecidotea. But then it might take a  
dissecting microscope to tell them apart anyway.


Although a less expensive format would have served as well, it is a  
good introduction to the cave life of a major cave area.--Bill Mixon


My ZIP code, my Social Security number, my telephone number, and my  
driver's license number add up to one billion, six hundred and fifty  
six million, five hundred and twenty seven thousand, four hundred and  
ninety.


You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
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[Texascavers] book review: Cave File of the Virginias

[Mixon Bill]

Cave Life of the Virginias: A Field Guide to Commonly Encountered  
Species. Daniel W. Fong, Megan L. Porter, and Michael E. Slay.  
Biology Section of the National Speleological Society; 2012. 5 by 8.5  
inches, 42 pages, spiral bound. $16 plus shipping from NSS Bookstore  
or Speleobooks.


This is the first of a proposed Cave Life Series on cave regions in  
the United States. Between a brief introduction and a nice  
bibliography, the book consists of one or two pages on each major type  
of cave critter one is likely to see in Virginia or West Virginia. For  
obligate cave species (troglobionts and stygobionts), there are  
distribution maps of the various species. There is a color photograph  
of a representative of each type, such as isopod or amphipod. The book  
is nicely printed on paper thickly laminated to be waterproof and  
maybe bulletproof. With the plastic spiral binding, it could serve as  
a field guide, but I'm not sure what use it would be in the field,  
unless you can't tell an pseudoscorpion from a cave cricket. Unlike a  
bird guide, it doesn't illustrate all the species it discusses, so it  
won't help distinguish, for example, among the seven species of  
asellid isopods in the genus Caecidotea. But then it might take a  
dissecting microscope to tell them apart anyway.


Although a less expensive format would have served as well, it is a  
good introduction to the cave life of a major cave area.--Bill Mixon


My ZIP code, my Social Security number, my telephone number, and my  
driver's license number add up to one billion, six hundred and fifty  
six million, five hundred and twenty seven thousand, four hundred and  
ninety.


You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: edi...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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[Texascavers] book review: Guide to Indiana caves

[Mixon Bill]

A Guide to Caves and Karst of Indiana. Samuel S. Frushour, with a  
contribution by Julian Lewis and Salisa Lewis. Indiana University  
Press, Bloomington; 2012. ISBN 978-0-253-00096-5. 5.5 by 8.5 inches,  
152 pages, softbound. $22.


Since Caves of Indiana was published by the Indiana Geological  
Survey in 1961, there have been some books on specific Indiana caves,  
notably Wyandotte and Binkleys, but the only general books on the  
state have been NSS convention guidebooks. Caves of Indiana' was a  
traditional, for the time, catalog of caves, with locations, brief  
descriptions, and maps. I am on the cover of that book, but I didn't  
realize it until more than ten years later, when I saw a larger copy  
of the photograph and recognized my helmet.


This new popular introduction to Indiana caves and karst, written by a  
caver recently retired from the state's geological survey, is part of  
the press's Indiana Natural Science series. It is mainly an elementary  
introduction to the geology and biology of Indiana's caves and karst  
areas. Some of the karst areas, such as the Lost River and the  
sinkholes of the Mitchell Plain (now apparently the Mitchell Plateau)  
have long been famous and, in fact, literally textbook examples, as in  
Thornbury's Principles of Geomorphology of 1954. (The fact that  
Thrornbury was at Indiana University might have had something to do  
with that, but his long chapter on karst was and still is unusual for  
an introductory textbook.) These and other features of the  
physiographic provinces in Indiana that have caves are described and  
illustrated by color photographs or drawings on nearly every page. I  
would have liked to see a discussion of the special problems of  
groundwater pollution in karst. The biology chapter by the Lewises is  
less satisfactory, being almost entirely a catalog of critters, with  
no overview of cave ecology or evolution. It is also especially prone  
to use technical words without defining them, although many can be  
found in the glossary.


Besides the scientific content, the book includes descriptions and  
simple maps of the show caves in the state, and there are also maps  
and descriptions of eight wild caves, all of them simple horizontal  
caves managed by state agencies and suitable for beginners. There is  
good information on safety and conservation for cavers, largely based  
on the little NSS booklet on responsible caving, and an appendix lists  
national and state caving organizations.


The book is somewhat disorganized and could have benefited from  
editing in other ways, but this guide meets its educational goal  
fairly well.--Bill Mixon


Nature is a hanging judge.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
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AMCS: edi...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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[Texascavers] book review: Guide to Indiana caves

[Mixon Bill]

A Guide to Caves and Karst of Indiana. Samuel S. Frushour, with a  
contribution by Julian Lewis and Salisa Lewis. Indiana University  
Press, Bloomington; 2012. ISBN 978-0-253-00096-5. 5.5 by 8.5 inches,  
152 pages, softbound. $22.


Since Caves of Indiana was published by the Indiana Geological  
Survey in 1961, there have been some books on specific Indiana caves,  
notably Wyandotte and Binkleys, but the only general books on the  
state have been NSS convention guidebooks. Caves of Indiana' was a  
traditional, for the time, catalog of caves, with locations, brief  
descriptions, and maps. I am on the cover of that book, but I didn't  
realize it until more than ten years later, when I saw a larger copy  
of the photograph and recognized my helmet.


This new popular introduction to Indiana caves and karst, written by a  
caver recently retired from the state's geological survey, is part of  
the press's Indiana Natural Science series. It is mainly an elementary  
introduction to the geology and biology of Indiana's caves and karst  
areas. Some of the karst areas, such as the Lost River and the  
sinkholes of the Mitchell Plain (now apparently the Mitchell Plateau)  
have long been famous and, in fact, literally textbook examples, as in  
Thornbury's Principles of Geomorphology of 1954. (The fact that  
Thrornbury was at Indiana University might have had something to do  
with that, but his long chapter on karst was and still is unusual for  
an introductory textbook.) These and other features of the  
physiographic provinces in Indiana that have caves are described and  
illustrated by color photographs or drawings on nearly every page. I  
would have liked to see a discussion of the special problems of  
groundwater pollution in karst. The biology chapter by the Lewises is  
less satisfactory, being almost entirely a catalog of critters, with  
no overview of cave ecology or evolution. It is also especially prone  
to use technical words without defining them, although many can be  
found in the glossary.


Besides the scientific content, the book includes descriptions and  
simple maps of the show caves in the state, and there are also maps  
and descriptions of eight wild caves, all of them simple horizontal  
caves managed by state agencies and suitable for beginners. There is  
good information on safety and conservation for cavers, largely based  
on the little NSS booklet on responsible caving, and an appendix lists  
national and state caving organizations.


The book is somewhat disorganized and could have benefited from  
editing in other ways, but this guide meets its educational goal  
fairly well.--Bill Mixon


Nature is a hanging judge.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: edi...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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Re: [Texascavers] book review: cave life

[Andy Gluesenkamp]

I finally got my hands on a copy of Cave Life of Oklahoma and Arkansas.  
After reading Mixon's screed (below), I was expecting the thing to fall apart 
in my hands, leaving nasty stains on my fingers.  
Not so.  
I found lots of useful and interesting information on the history of caving in 
the area, tons of information on the biology of cave organisms, and amazing 
photos.  I looked into the statistical analyses that Mixon wailed about and 
found them to be essentially identical to approaches employed by other 
researchers (Culver et al.).  In any case, there is much more to the book than 
stats.
I can't say that it is the best regional biospeleology book out there but I can 
say that one shouldn't put too much stock in reviews from someone who has an ax 
to grind with professional biologists and who dismisses conservation biology as 
simply a money making racket.  

I recommend this book to anyone interested in caves and cave biology in 
Arkansas and Oklahoma.

Andy


Andrew G. Gluesenkamp, Ph.D.

700 Billie Brooks Drive

Driftwood, Texas 78619

(512) 799-1095

a...@gluesenkamp.com

--- On Wed, 4/4/12, Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com wrote:

From: Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com
Subject: [Texascavers] book review: cave life
To: Cavers Texas texascavers@texascavers.com
Date: Wednesday, April 4, 2012, 12:54 PM

Cave Life of Oklahoma and Arkansas: Exploration and Conservation of 
Subterranean Biodiversity. G. O. Graening, Danté B. Fenolio, and Michael E. 
Slay. University of Oklahoma Press (Animal Natural History Series), Norman; 
2011. ISBN 978-0-8061-4223-4. 6 by 9 inches, 226 pages, hardbound. $59.95.

This small but expensive book is sort of a hybrid between an introduction to 
cave biology and its conservation in the area and a formal contract report for 
the Subterranean Biodiversity Project. A casual reader can get a pretty good 
notion about the principles of cave biology from parts of the text and the 
color photos, but he'll have to put up with an awful lot of pedantry and 
pseudo-science along the way, because the book is very heavily biased toward 
the report aspect. The authors have compiled an extensive record of animals 
seen in caves in Oklahoma and Arkansas, with 1355 taxa listed, 690 to the 
species level, in Appendix A. Much of the data resulted from generally brief 
visits to a large number of caves, where eyeball searches were used. But a 
considerable amount was obtained from extensive surveys of literature, from 
scientific papers to caving-club magazines. The authors recognize that this has 
resulted in a rather unsystematic database of a
 pretty random collection of observations, but that doesn't discourage them 
from applying lots of statistics. The actual scientific value of the book is 
the list of fauna and the caves in which they were observed, which in principle 
makes it possible to at least create distribution maps. However, that won't be 
easy in practice, because they've elected to put the distribution data in 
Appendix B, which is the list of caves and the serial numbers of the taxa in 
Appendix A that were seen in each of them. That means that to find out where a 
given species has been found one must search for its number throughout that 
fifteen-page Appendix B. It would have been a whole lot better to number the 
caves, not the taxa, and list the cave numbers for each taxon in Appendix A, 
with just the names (or, often, just cave-survey numbers) of the caves in 
numerical order in Appendix B.

The authors seem to think they were being paid by the number of literature 
citations they could cram into the text, and so the innocent reader is 
subjected, for example, to numerous citations for things that are common 
knowledge about biospeleology and can be found in any introduction to the 
subject. It's a rare paragraph that doesn't have several intrusive citations. 
Some pedantry, such as a half-page list of the collecting permits the project 
had, is easy to skip over, but then there are things like the information that 
they used Access 2007 (Microsoft Corp., Redmond, Washington). Who cares what 
database they used? Who else makes Access? How many Microsofts are there?

The pseudo-science comes in when the authors apply statistical techniques to 
their data, despite its acknowledged limitation and biases. For example, for 
each site they recorded qualitative data such as how extensively it is visited, 
lightly, moderately, or heavily. Then they applied a statistical test to see 
whether this affects species richness. In this case, they find that the most 
heavily visited caves have the greatest biological diversity, to their 
surprise, but this is just because cavers prefer to visit longer caves. 
Correlation is not causation. They fit curves to scatter plots of things like 
site richness versus site length, even though there is no theoretical reason to 
expect the data to fit that particular form of equation. In one case, they fit 
both linear and exponential

Re: [Texascavers] book review: cave life

[Tim Stich]

Great book review, Bill! I never fail to get a smile out of your write ups.

-Tim Stich

Re: [Texascavers] book review: cave life

[Andy Gluesenkamp]

I agree, Tim.  

They are always entertaining, like listening to Rush Limbaugh.  

A discriminating reader should not confuse entertaining screeds with actual 
informed content.


Andrew G. Gluesenkamp, Ph.D.

700 Billie Brooks Drive

Driftwood, Texas 78619

(512) 799-1095

a...@gluesenkamp.com

--- On Thu, 4/19/12, Tim Stich timstic...@gmail.com wrote:

From: Tim Stich timstic...@gmail.com
Subject: Re: [Texascavers] book review: cave life
To: Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com
Cc: Cavers Texas texascavers@texascavers.com
Date: Thursday, April 19, 2012, 12:09 PM

Great book review, Bill! I never fail to get a smile out of your write ups.
 
-Tim Stich

Re: [Texascavers] book review: cave life

[Andy Gluesenkamp]

I finally got my hands on a copy of Cave Life of Oklahoma and Arkansas.  
After reading Mixon's screed (below), I was expecting the thing to fall apart 
in my hands, leaving nasty stains on my fingers.  
Not so.  
I found lots of useful and interesting information on the history of caving in 
the area, tons of information on the biology of cave organisms, and amazing 
photos.  I looked into the statistical analyses that Mixon wailed about and 
found them to be essentially identical to approaches employed by other 
researchers (Culver et al.).  In any case, there is much more to the book than 
stats.
I can't say that it is the best regional biospeleology book out there but I can 
say that one shouldn't put too much stock in reviews from someone who has an ax 
to grind with professional biologists and who dismisses conservation biology as 
simply a money making racket.  

I recommend this book to anyone interested in caves and cave biology in 
Arkansas and Oklahoma.

Andy


Andrew G. Gluesenkamp, Ph.D.

700 Billie Brooks Drive

Driftwood, Texas 78619

(512) 799-1095

a...@gluesenkamp.com

--- On Wed, 4/4/12, Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com wrote:

From: Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com
Subject: [Texascavers] book review: cave life
To: Cavers Texas texascavers@texascavers.com
List-Post: texascavers@texascavers.com
Date: Wednesday, April 4, 2012, 12:54 PM

Cave Life of Oklahoma and Arkansas: Exploration and Conservation of 
Subterranean Biodiversity. G. O. Graening, Danté B. Fenolio, and Michael E. 
Slay. University of Oklahoma Press (Animal Natural History Series), Norman; 
2011. ISBN 978-0-8061-4223-4. 6 by 9 inches, 226 pages, hardbound. $59.95.

This small but expensive book is sort of a hybrid between an introduction to 
cave biology and its conservation in the area and a formal contract report for 
the Subterranean Biodiversity Project. A casual reader can get a pretty good 
notion about the principles of cave biology from parts of the text and the 
color photos, but he'll have to put up with an awful lot of pedantry and 
pseudo-science along the way, because the book is very heavily biased toward 
the report aspect. The authors have compiled an extensive record of animals 
seen in caves in Oklahoma and Arkansas, with 1355 taxa listed, 690 to the 
species level, in Appendix A. Much of the data resulted from generally brief 
visits to a large number of caves, where eyeball searches were used. But a 
considerable amount was obtained from extensive surveys of literature, from 
scientific papers to caving-club magazines. The authors recognize that this has 
resulted in a rather unsystematic database of a
 pretty random collection of observations, but that doesn't discourage them 
from applying lots of statistics. The actual scientific value of the book is 
the list of fauna and the caves in which they were observed, which in principle 
makes it possible to at least create distribution maps. However, that won't be 
easy in practice, because they've elected to put the distribution data in 
Appendix B, which is the list of caves and the serial numbers of the taxa in 
Appendix A that were seen in each of them. That means that to find out where a 
given species has been found one must search for its number throughout that 
fifteen-page Appendix B. It would have been a whole lot better to number the 
caves, not the taxa, and list the cave numbers for each taxon in Appendix A, 
with just the names (or, often, just cave-survey numbers) of the caves in 
numerical order in Appendix B.

The authors seem to think they were being paid by the number of literature 
citations they could cram into the text, and so the innocent reader is 
subjected, for example, to numerous citations for things that are common 
knowledge about biospeleology and can be found in any introduction to the 
subject. It's a rare paragraph that doesn't have several intrusive citations. 
Some pedantry, such as a half-page list of the collecting permits the project 
had, is easy to skip over, but then there are things like the information that 
they used Access 2007 (Microsoft Corp., Redmond, Washington). Who cares what 
database they used? Who else makes Access? How many Microsofts are there?

The pseudo-science comes in when the authors apply statistical techniques to 
their data, despite its acknowledged limitation and biases. For example, for 
each site they recorded qualitative data such as how extensively it is visited, 
lightly, moderately, or heavily. Then they applied a statistical test to see 
whether this affects species richness. In this case, they find that the most 
heavily visited caves have the greatest biological diversity, to their 
surprise, but this is just because cavers prefer to visit longer caves. 
Correlation is not causation. They fit curves to scatter plots of things like 
site richness versus site length, even though there is no theoretical reason to 
expect the data to fit that particular form of equation. In one case

Re: [Texascavers] book review: cave life

[Tim Stich]

Great book review, Bill! I never fail to get a smile out of your write ups.

-Tim Stich

Re: [Texascavers] book review: cave life

[Andy Gluesenkamp]

I agree, Tim.  

They are always entertaining, like listening to Rush Limbaugh.  

A discriminating reader should not confuse entertaining screeds with actual 
informed content.


Andrew G. Gluesenkamp, Ph.D.

700 Billie Brooks Drive

Driftwood, Texas 78619

(512) 799-1095

a...@gluesenkamp.com

--- On Thu, 4/19/12, Tim Stich timstic...@gmail.com wrote:

From: Tim Stich timstic...@gmail.com
Subject: Re: [Texascavers] book review: cave life
To: Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com
Cc: Cavers Texas texascavers@texascavers.com
List-Post: texascavers@texascavers.com
Date: Thursday, April 19, 2012, 12:09 PM

Great book review, Bill! I never fail to get a smile out of your write ups.
 
-Tim Stich

Re: [Texascavers] book review: cave life

[Andy Gluesenkamp]

I finally got my hands on a copy of Cave Life of Oklahoma and Arkansas.  
After reading Mixon's screed (below), I was expecting the thing to fall apart 
in my hands, leaving nasty stains on my fingers.  
Not so.  
I found lots of useful and interesting information on the history of caving in 
the area, tons of information on the biology of cave organisms, and amazing 
photos.  I looked into the statistical analyses that Mixon wailed about and 
found them to be essentially identical to approaches employed by other 
researchers (Culver et al.).  In any case, there is much more to the book than 
stats.
I can't say that it is the best regional biospeleology book out there but I can 
say that one shouldn't put too much stock in reviews from someone who has an ax 
to grind with professional biologists and who dismisses conservation biology as 
simply a money making racket.  

I recommend this book to anyone interested in caves and cave biology in 
Arkansas and Oklahoma.

Andy


Andrew G. Gluesenkamp, Ph.D.

700 Billie Brooks Drive

Driftwood, Texas 78619

(512) 799-1095

a...@gluesenkamp.com

--- On Wed, 4/4/12, Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com wrote:

From: Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com
Subject: [Texascavers] book review: cave life
To: Cavers Texas texascavers@texascavers.com
List-Post: texascavers@texascavers.com
Date: Wednesday, April 4, 2012, 12:54 PM

Cave Life of Oklahoma and Arkansas: Exploration and Conservation of 
Subterranean Biodiversity. G. O. Graening, Danté B. Fenolio, and Michael E. 
Slay. University of Oklahoma Press (Animal Natural History Series), Norman; 
2011. ISBN 978-0-8061-4223-4. 6 by 9 inches, 226 pages, hardbound. $59.95.

This small but expensive book is sort of a hybrid between an introduction to 
cave biology and its conservation in the area and a formal contract report for 
the Subterranean Biodiversity Project. A casual reader can get a pretty good 
notion about the principles of cave biology from parts of the text and the 
color photos, but he'll have to put up with an awful lot of pedantry and 
pseudo-science along the way, because the book is very heavily biased toward 
the report aspect. The authors have compiled an extensive record of animals 
seen in caves in Oklahoma and Arkansas, with 1355 taxa listed, 690 to the 
species level, in Appendix A. Much of the data resulted from generally brief 
visits to a large number of caves, where eyeball searches were used. But a 
considerable amount was obtained from extensive surveys of literature, from 
scientific papers to caving-club magazines. The authors recognize that this has 
resulted in a rather unsystematic database of a
 pretty random collection of observations, but that doesn't discourage them 
from applying lots of statistics. The actual scientific value of the book is 
the list of fauna and the caves in which they were observed, which in principle 
makes it possible to at least create distribution maps. However, that won't be 
easy in practice, because they've elected to put the distribution data in 
Appendix B, which is the list of caves and the serial numbers of the taxa in 
Appendix A that were seen in each of them. That means that to find out where a 
given species has been found one must search for its number throughout that 
fifteen-page Appendix B. It would have been a whole lot better to number the 
caves, not the taxa, and list the cave numbers for each taxon in Appendix A, 
with just the names (or, often, just cave-survey numbers) of the caves in 
numerical order in Appendix B.

The authors seem to think they were being paid by the number of literature 
citations they could cram into the text, and so the innocent reader is 
subjected, for example, to numerous citations for things that are common 
knowledge about biospeleology and can be found in any introduction to the 
subject. It's a rare paragraph that doesn't have several intrusive citations. 
Some pedantry, such as a half-page list of the collecting permits the project 
had, is easy to skip over, but then there are things like the information that 
they used Access 2007 (Microsoft Corp., Redmond, Washington). Who cares what 
database they used? Who else makes Access? How many Microsofts are there?

The pseudo-science comes in when the authors apply statistical techniques to 
their data, despite its acknowledged limitation and biases. For example, for 
each site they recorded qualitative data such as how extensively it is visited, 
lightly, moderately, or heavily. Then they applied a statistical test to see 
whether this affects species richness. In this case, they find that the most 
heavily visited caves have the greatest biological diversity, to their 
surprise, but this is just because cavers prefer to visit longer caves. 
Correlation is not causation. They fit curves to scatter plots of things like 
site richness versus site length, even though there is no theoretical reason to 
expect the data to fit that particular form of equation. In one case

Re: [Texascavers] book review: cave life

[Tim Stich]

Great book review, Bill! I never fail to get a smile out of your write ups.

-Tim Stich

Re: [Texascavers] book review: cave life

[Andy Gluesenkamp]

I agree, Tim.  

They are always entertaining, like listening to Rush Limbaugh.  

A discriminating reader should not confuse entertaining screeds with actual 
informed content.


Andrew G. Gluesenkamp, Ph.D.

700 Billie Brooks Drive

Driftwood, Texas 78619

(512) 799-1095

a...@gluesenkamp.com

--- On Thu, 4/19/12, Tim Stich timstic...@gmail.com wrote:

From: Tim Stich timstic...@gmail.com
Subject: Re: [Texascavers] book review: cave life
To: Mixon Bill bmixon...@austin.rr.com
Cc: Cavers Texas texascavers@texascavers.com
List-Post: texascavers@texascavers.com
Date: Thursday, April 19, 2012, 12:09 PM

Great book review, Bill! I never fail to get a smile out of your write ups.
 
-Tim Stich

[Texascavers] book review: cave life

[Mixon Bill]

Cave Life of Oklahoma and Arkansas: Exploration and Conservation of  
Subterranean Biodiversity. G. O. Graening, Danté B. Fenolio, and  
Michael E. Slay. University of Oklahoma Press (Animal Natural History  
Series), Norman; 2011. ISBN 978-0-8061-4223-4. 6 by 9 inches, 226  
pages, hardbound. $59.95.


This small but expensive book is sort of a hybrid between an  
introduction to cave biology and its conservation in the area and a  
formal contract report for the Subterranean Biodiversity Project. A  
casual reader can get a pretty good notion about the principles of  
cave biology from parts of the text and the color photos, but he'll  
have to put up with an awful lot of pedantry and pseudo-science along  
the way, because the book is very heavily biased toward the report  
aspect. The authors have compiled an extensive record of animals seen  
in caves in Oklahoma and Arkansas, with 1355 taxa listed, 690 to the  
species level, in Appendix A. Much of the data resulted from generally  
brief visits to a large number of caves, where eyeball searches were  
used. But a considerable amount was obtained from extensive surveys of  
literature, from scientific papers to caving-club magazines. The  
authors recognize that this has resulted in a rather unsystematic  
database of a pretty random collection of observations, but that  
doesn't discourage them from applying lots of statistics. The actual  
scientific value of the book is the list of fauna and the caves in  
which they were observed, which in principle makes it possible to at  
least create distribution maps. However, that won't be easy in  
practice, because they've elected to put the distribution data in  
Appendix B, which is the list of caves and the serial numbers of the  
taxa in Appendix A that were seen in each of them. That means that to  
find out where a given species has been found one must search for its  
number throughout that fifteen-page Appendix B. It would have been a  
whole lot better to number the caves, not the taxa, and list the cave  
numbers for each taxon in Appendix A, with just the names (or, often,  
just cave-survey numbers) of the caves in numerical order in Appendix B.


The authors seem to think they were being paid by the number of  
literature citations they could cram into the text, and so the  
innocent reader is subjected, for example, to numerous citations for  
things that are common knowledge about biospeleology and can be found  
in any introduction to the subject. It's a rare paragraph that doesn't  
have several intrusive citations. Some pedantry, such as a half-page  
list of the collecting permits the project had, is easy to skip over,  
but then there are things like the information that they used Access  
2007 (Microsoft Corp., Redmond, Washington). Who cares what database  
they used? Who else makes Access? How many Microsofts are there?


The pseudo-science comes in when the authors apply statistical  
techniques to their data, despite its acknowledged limitation and  
biases. For example, for each site they recorded qualitative data such  
as how extensively it is visited, lightly, moderately, or heavily.  
Then they applied a statistical test to see whether this affects  
species richness. In this case, they find that the most heavily  
visited caves have the greatest biological diversity, to their  
surprise, but this is just because cavers prefer to visit longer  
caves. Correlation is not causation. They fit curves to scatter plots  
of things like site richness versus site length, even though there is  
no theoretical reason to expect the data to fit that particular form  
of equation. In one case, they fit both linear and exponential  
functions to the same data, displaying the best-fit coefficients to  
four allegedly significant digits with no confidence intervals. Both  
fits give p  .0001. What p is that? I doubt the authors know; it just  
fell out of the software. The mathematical qualifications of the  
authors may be judged by the statement that the number of taxa found  
at a site tends to increase exponentially with the number of specimens  
collected.


In truth, there is a good bit of useful information buried in this  
book, and I suppose even a lay reader who is not as easily annoyed as  
I am could learn some things from it. But I shudder to think of the  
graduate students who will accept this book as a good style guide for  
their theses and dissertations. It is an excellent example of what  
happens when somebody carelessly leaves statistics software lying  
around where anybody can get at it.--Bill Mixon


The winner of the rat race is still a rat.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: edi...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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Visit 

[Texascavers] book review: cave life

[Mixon Bill]

Cave Life of Oklahoma and Arkansas: Exploration and Conservation of  
Subterranean Biodiversity. G. O. Graening, Danté B. Fenolio, and  
Michael E. Slay. University of Oklahoma Press (Animal Natural History  
Series), Norman; 2011. ISBN 978-0-8061-4223-4. 6 by 9 inches, 226  
pages, hardbound. $59.95.


This small but expensive book is sort of a hybrid between an  
introduction to cave biology and its conservation in the area and a  
formal contract report for the Subterranean Biodiversity Project. A  
casual reader can get a pretty good notion about the principles of  
cave biology from parts of the text and the color photos, but he'll  
have to put up with an awful lot of pedantry and pseudo-science along  
the way, because the book is very heavily biased toward the report  
aspect. The authors have compiled an extensive record of animals seen  
in caves in Oklahoma and Arkansas, with 1355 taxa listed, 690 to the  
species level, in Appendix A. Much of the data resulted from generally  
brief visits to a large number of caves, where eyeball searches were  
used. But a considerable amount was obtained from extensive surveys of  
literature, from scientific papers to caving-club magazines. The  
authors recognize that this has resulted in a rather unsystematic  
database of a pretty random collection of observations, but that  
doesn't discourage them from applying lots of statistics. The actual  
scientific value of the book is the list of fauna and the caves in  
which they were observed, which in principle makes it possible to at  
least create distribution maps. However, that won't be easy in  
practice, because they've elected to put the distribution data in  
Appendix B, which is the list of caves and the serial numbers of the  
taxa in Appendix A that were seen in each of them. That means that to  
find out where a given species has been found one must search for its  
number throughout that fifteen-page Appendix B. It would have been a  
whole lot better to number the caves, not the taxa, and list the cave  
numbers for each taxon in Appendix A, with just the names (or, often,  
just cave-survey numbers) of the caves in numerical order in Appendix B.


The authors seem to think they were being paid by the number of  
literature citations they could cram into the text, and so the  
innocent reader is subjected, for example, to numerous citations for  
things that are common knowledge about biospeleology and can be found  
in any introduction to the subject. It's a rare paragraph that doesn't  
have several intrusive citations. Some pedantry, such as a half-page  
list of the collecting permits the project had, is easy to skip over,  
but then there are things like the information that they used Access  
2007 (Microsoft Corp., Redmond, Washington). Who cares what database  
they used? Who else makes Access? How many Microsofts are there?


The pseudo-science comes in when the authors apply statistical  
techniques to their data, despite its acknowledged limitation and  
biases. For example, for each site they recorded qualitative data such  
as how extensively it is visited, lightly, moderately, or heavily.  
Then they applied a statistical test to see whether this affects  
species richness. In this case, they find that the most heavily  
visited caves have the greatest biological diversity, to their  
surprise, but this is just because cavers prefer to visit longer  
caves. Correlation is not causation. They fit curves to scatter plots  
of things like site richness versus site length, even though there is  
no theoretical reason to expect the data to fit that particular form  
of equation. In one case, they fit both linear and exponential  
functions to the same data, displaying the best-fit coefficients to  
four allegedly significant digits with no confidence intervals. Both  
fits give p  .0001. What p is that? I doubt the authors know; it just  
fell out of the software. The mathematical qualifications of the  
authors may be judged by the statement that the number of taxa found  
at a site tends to increase exponentially with the number of specimens  
collected.


In truth, there is a good bit of useful information buried in this  
book, and I suppose even a lay reader who is not as easily annoyed as  
I am could learn some things from it. But I shudder to think of the  
graduate students who will accept this book as a good style guide for  
their theses and dissertations. It is an excellent example of what  
happens when somebody carelessly leaves statistics software lying  
around where anybody can get at it.--Bill Mixon


The winner of the rat race is still a rat.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: edi...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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Visit 

[Texascavers] book review -- bats

[Mixon Bill]

Bats of the United States and Canada. Michael J. Harvey, J. Scott  
Altenbach, and Troy L. Best. Johns Hopkins University Press,  
Baltimore; 2011. ISBN 978-1-4214-0191-1. 5 by 8 inches, 202 pages,  
softbound. $24.95.


There are forty-seven species of bats living in North America north of  
Mexico. Four others, including the hairy-legged vampire, have been  
seen at least once but are considered accidentals, with no permanent  
population. The first half of this nice little book is devoted to a  
pretty thorough, if brief, review of all aspects of bats, including  
their biology, importance, and conservation issues. The latter is up  
to date, with both white-nose syndrome and wind turbines mentioned. As  
usual, we are asked to accept uncritically that bats must be  
beneficial because they eat insects. The second half runs through all  
the forty-seven species, with a page of text, a distribution map, and  
a large color photo. These are sorted by family, but that is hard to  
discover, since the family is not mentioned in the descriptions. A  
table in the appendix lists the species by family, with a code for  
their conservation status, such as endangered or threatened.--Bill Mixon


Never play leadfrog with a unicorn.

You may reply to the address this message
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[Texascavers] book review -- bats

[Mixon Bill]

Bats of the United States and Canada. Michael J. Harvey, J. Scott  
Altenbach, and Troy L. Best. Johns Hopkins University Press,  
Baltimore; 2011. ISBN 978-1-4214-0191-1. 5 by 8 inches, 202 pages,  
softbound. $24.95.


There are forty-seven species of bats living in North America north of  
Mexico. Four others, including the hairy-legged vampire, have been  
seen at least once but are considered accidentals, with no permanent  
population. The first half of this nice little book is devoted to a  
pretty thorough, if brief, review of all aspects of bats, including  
their biology, importance, and conservation issues. The latter is up  
to date, with both white-nose syndrome and wind turbines mentioned. As  
usual, we are asked to accept uncritically that bats must be  
beneficial because they eat insects. The second half runs through all  
the forty-seven species, with a page of text, a distribution map, and  
a large color photo. These are sorted by family, but that is hard to  
discover, since the family is not mentioned in the descriptions. A  
table in the appendix lists the species by family, with a code for  
their conservation status, such as endangered or threatened.--Bill Mixon


Never play leadfrog with a unicorn.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: edi...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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[Texascavers] book review -- bats

[Mixon Bill]

Bats of the United States and Canada. Michael J. Harvey, J. Scott  
Altenbach, and Troy L. Best. Johns Hopkins University Press,  
Baltimore; 2011. ISBN 978-1-4214-0191-1. 5 by 8 inches, 202 pages,  
softbound. $24.95.


There are forty-seven species of bats living in North America north of  
Mexico. Four others, including the hairy-legged vampire, have been  
seen at least once but are considered accidentals, with no permanent  
population. The first half of this nice little book is devoted to a  
pretty thorough, if brief, review of all aspects of bats, including  
their biology, importance, and conservation issues. The latter is up  
to date, with both white-nose syndrome and wind turbines mentioned. As  
usual, we are asked to accept uncritically that bats must be  
beneficial because they eat insects. The second half runs through all  
the forty-seven species, with a page of text, a distribution map, and  
a large color photo. These are sorted by family, but that is hard to  
discover, since the family is not mentioned in the descriptions. A  
table in the appendix lists the species by family, with a code for  
their conservation status, such as endangered or threatened.--Bill Mixon


Never play leadfrog with a unicorn.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
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[Texascavers] book review--paleoecology in Hawaii

[Mixon Bill]

Back to the Future in the Caves of Kauaʻi: A Scientist's Adventures in  
the Dark. David A. Burney. Yale University Press, New Haven; 2011. 6  
by 9 inches, xv+198 pages. Hardbound ISBN 978-0-300-15094-0, $28;  
softbound ISBN 978-0-300-17209-6, $18.


In pursuit of his interest in paleoecology, or the study of how the  
arrival of humans has changed ecosystems worldwide, the author began  
an investigation in Makauwahi Cave on the southeastern coast of the  
Hawaiian island of Kauaʻi. A solution cave in eolianite limestone that  
also spent some time as a sea cave, it now consists mainly of a large,  
open collapse sinkhole. Excavation and coring of the deposits on the  
floor of the sink have disclosed a lot of information about the  
changes in the island's flora and fauna since the arrival of  
Polynesians about a thousand years ago and then Europeans in 1788.  
Before it's discovery by man, the only mammal on the island was a bat.  
A large fraction of the plants and animals on the Hawaiian islands  
were unable to cope with the the Polynesian's rats, dogs, and pigs and  
the European's goats, not to mention many invasive plants introduced  
accidentally or on purpose. Many have gone extinct, and hundreds of  
officially endangered species hang on only in remote and inaccessible  
areas.


More recently, the author and his wife have spearheaded restoration of  
the ancient ecology in the sinkhole and some of the surrounding area.  
The Makauwahi Cave Reserve is now a popular attraction due to the  
thriving native plants. The book is in a popular style, but has many  
references to the scientific literature. Very readable, if not exactly  
cavey in the usual sense.--Bill Mixon


Never play leadfrog with a unicorn.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
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[Texascavers] book review--paleoecology in Hawaii

[Mixon Bill]

Back to the Future in the Caves of Kauaʻi: A Scientist's Adventures in  
the Dark. David A. Burney. Yale University Press, New Haven; 2011. 6  
by 9 inches, xv+198 pages. Hardbound ISBN 978-0-300-15094-0, $28;  
softbound ISBN 978-0-300-17209-6, $18.


In pursuit of his interest in paleoecology, or the study of how the  
arrival of humans has changed ecosystems worldwide, the author began  
an investigation in Makauwahi Cave on the southeastern coast of the  
Hawaiian island of Kauaʻi. A solution cave in eolianite limestone that  
also spent some time as a sea cave, it now consists mainly of a large,  
open collapse sinkhole. Excavation and coring of the deposits on the  
floor of the sink have disclosed a lot of information about the  
changes in the island's flora and fauna since the arrival of  
Polynesians about a thousand years ago and then Europeans in 1788.  
Before it's discovery by man, the only mammal on the island was a bat.  
A large fraction of the plants and animals on the Hawaiian islands  
were unable to cope with the the Polynesian's rats, dogs, and pigs and  
the European's goats, not to mention many invasive plants introduced  
accidentally or on purpose. Many have gone extinct, and hundreds of  
officially endangered species hang on only in remote and inaccessible  
areas.


More recently, the author and his wife have spearheaded restoration of  
the ancient ecology in the sinkhole and some of the surrounding area.  
The Makauwahi Cave Reserve is now a popular attraction due to the  
thriving native plants. The book is in a popular style, but has many  
references to the scientific literature. Very readable, if not exactly  
cavey in the usual sense.--Bill Mixon


Never play leadfrog with a unicorn.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: edi...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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[Texascavers] book review--paleoecology in Hawaii

[Mixon Bill]

Back to the Future in the Caves of Kauaʻi: A Scientist's Adventures in  
the Dark. David A. Burney. Yale University Press, New Haven; 2011. 6  
by 9 inches, xv+198 pages. Hardbound ISBN 978-0-300-15094-0, $28;  
softbound ISBN 978-0-300-17209-6, $18.


In pursuit of his interest in paleoecology, or the study of how the  
arrival of humans has changed ecosystems worldwide, the author began  
an investigation in Makauwahi Cave on the southeastern coast of the  
Hawaiian island of Kauaʻi. A solution cave in eolianite limestone that  
also spent some time as a sea cave, it now consists mainly of a large,  
open collapse sinkhole. Excavation and coring of the deposits on the  
floor of the sink have disclosed a lot of information about the  
changes in the island's flora and fauna since the arrival of  
Polynesians about a thousand years ago and then Europeans in 1788.  
Before it's discovery by man, the only mammal on the island was a bat.  
A large fraction of the plants and animals on the Hawaiian islands  
were unable to cope with the the Polynesian's rats, dogs, and pigs and  
the European's goats, not to mention many invasive plants introduced  
accidentally or on purpose. Many have gone extinct, and hundreds of  
officially endangered species hang on only in remote and inaccessible  
areas.


More recently, the author and his wife have spearheaded restoration of  
the ancient ecology in the sinkhole and some of the surrounding area.  
The Makauwahi Cave Reserve is now a popular attraction due to the  
thriving native plants. The book is in a popular style, but has many  
references to the scientific literature. Very readable, if not exactly  
cavey in the usual sense.--Bill Mixon


Never play leadfrog with a unicorn.

You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: edi...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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[Texascavers] book review: Maya caves

[Mixon Bill]

Exploring Maya Ritual Caves: Dark Secrets from the Maya Underworld.  
Stanislav Chládek. AltaMira, Lanham, Maryland; 2011. ISBN  
978-0-7591-1987-1. 5.5 by 9 inches, 228 pages, hardbound. $49.95.


In many parts of the Maya region, caves, or at least cenotes, were the  
only reliable source of water, and everywhere they were the portal to  
the underworld and its gods. The first half of the book is a general  
description of current thought about the relationship of the Maya to  
their caves. The second half describes visits the author made to many  
of the best known archaeological caves of the area, especially in  
Belize. There are numerous black-and-white photos throughout. They  
generally could use more contrast, and in at least one case I was  
unable to imagine the face allegedly carved into the stalagmite. These  
carved faces are always so crude compared to the elaborate carving on  
steles and building facades that I often wonder how many of them are  
imaginary altogether.


Chládek is a retired chemistry professor, and his previous outdoor  
experience was primarily in kayaks before he became interested in Maya  
cave archaeology. His bibliography is extensive, and he acknowledges  
assistance from some of the big names in Maya cave archaeology today  
and two anonymous reviewers, so the basic information in the first  
half of the book should pretty well reflect current thinking. But then  
within a few pages at the start of the second half I read of the three  
types of cave bats, insect, food, and vampire, of Cenote Dos Ojos  
with over six hundred kilometers of passages (they wish), and of the  
blind cave fish Ogilbia pearsel (for pearsei), which somewhat sapped  
my confidence.


Exploring Maya Ritual Caves is expensive for such a small book aimed  
at the general reader, but it is a fairly painless introduction to the  
important role caves played in the beliefs and activities of the Maya.— 
Bill Mixon


I believe there are
15,747,724,136,275,002,577,605,653,961,181,555,
468,044,717,914,527,116,709,366,231,425,076,185,
631,031,296 protons in the universe and the same number of electrons.— 
Sir Arthur Eddington


You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
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AMCS: edi...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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[Texascavers] book review: Maya caves

[Mixon Bill]

Exploring Maya Ritual Caves: Dark Secrets from the Maya Underworld.  
Stanislav Chládek. AltaMira, Lanham, Maryland; 2011. ISBN  
978-0-7591-1987-1. 5.5 by 9 inches, 228 pages, hardbound. $49.95.


In many parts of the Maya region, caves, or at least cenotes, were the  
only reliable source of water, and everywhere they were the portal to  
the underworld and its gods. The first half of the book is a general  
description of current thought about the relationship of the Maya to  
their caves. The second half describes visits the author made to many  
of the best known archaeological caves of the area, especially in  
Belize. There are numerous black-and-white photos throughout. They  
generally could use more contrast, and in at least one case I was  
unable to imagine the face allegedly carved into the stalagmite. These  
carved faces are always so crude compared to the elaborate carving on  
steles and building facades that I often wonder how many of them are  
imaginary altogether.


Chládek is a retired chemistry professor, and his previous outdoor  
experience was primarily in kayaks before he became interested in Maya  
cave archaeology. His bibliography is extensive, and he acknowledges  
assistance from some of the big names in Maya cave archaeology today  
and two anonymous reviewers, so the basic information in the first  
half of the book should pretty well reflect current thinking. But then  
within a few pages at the start of the second half I read of the three  
types of cave bats, insect, food, and vampire, of Cenote Dos Ojos  
with over six hundred kilometers of passages (they wish), and of the  
blind cave fish Ogilbia pearsel (for pearsei), which somewhat sapped  
my confidence.


Exploring Maya Ritual Caves is expensive for such a small book aimed  
at the general reader, but it is a fairly painless introduction to the  
important role caves played in the beliefs and activities of the Maya.— 
Bill Mixon


I believe there are
15,747,724,136,275,002,577,605,653,961,181,555,
468,044,717,914,527,116,709,366,231,425,076,185,
631,031,296 protons in the universe and the same number of electrons.— 
Sir Arthur Eddington


You may reply to the address this message
came from, but for long-term use, save:
Personal: bmi...@alumni.uchicago.edu
AMCS: edi...@amcs-pubs.org or sa...@amcs-pubs.org


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Re: [Texascavers] book review: Lew Bicking

[Mark Minton]

At 10:32 AM 8/6/2011, Mixon Bill wrote:

My favorite
summing up was written by Squire Lewis on encountering Bicking in
Mexico after the 1966 convention: Lew's only traveling and survival
equipment consists of a small Kelty pack whose sole contents are the
largest Spanish dictionary every printed--about a 20-pounder--and a
box of Mexican crackers. . . . His only clothes are those he wears,
and he obviously has some warped goal of not taking them off--ever-- 
for washing or any other purpose. . . . He has gotten all the long way

from Baltimore to California to [Mexico City] with nothing but his
great dictionary and his crackers. We have never seen him spend any
money--not any--he may well not have any.


That reminds me of a statement attributed, I believe, to a 
governor of Florida.  In reference to hikers or whomever coming to 
visit being good for the economy, he said something like, They come 
with only one pair of underwear and a five-dollar bill and don't 
change either.


Mark Minton

Please reply to mmin...@caver.net
Permanent email address is mmin...@illinoisalumni.org 



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Re: Re: [Texascavers] book review: Lew Bicking

[tbsamsel]

Fla. Guvs. SKINK = http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clinton_Tyree


Tyree was Governor of Florida in the 1970s. He was everything desirable in a candidate: a native of Florida, a college football star, and a decorated Vietnam veteran. He was dazzlingly handsome, charismatic, and articulate. He was also a former English professor at the University of Florida, though politically most people saw this as a handicap rather than an asset.
To the surprise of the Florida establishment, he was also one of the few, if not the only, honest men to hold the office. After he turned down a bribe from real estate developers, the developers assumed he was holding out for more money, and came back offering a larger bribe, along with a foolproof scheme for concealing the money. To their astonishment, the governor not only refused again, but had them arrested in an F.B.I. sting.
Tyree was also vehemently opposed to runaway growth in Florida, and gained national recognition for his passionate speeches and legislative proposals to discourage tourism, curtail land development, and protect the environment. (For example, one of his proposed laws would have required any boat driver who killed a manatee to immediately forfeit his boat, pay a $10,000 fine or go to jail for forty-five days, and bury the dead animal himself at a public ceremony).
Appalled, a group of Florida special interests pooled their resources to neutralize the governor politically, by bribing majorities in the state cabinet and the legislature to ignore or reject all of his initiatives.
Years later, the executive assistant to the current governor reviews Tyree’s history, and marvels at the futility of his struggle:

As popular as Clinton Tyree had been with the common folk of Florida, he stood no chance – none whatsoever – of disabling the machinery of greed and converting the legislature into a body of foresight and honest ethics. It was boggling to think a sane person would even try.
On the same day that the crooked developers who had tried to bribe Tyree were convicted, but punished with nothing more than probation, the legislature voted unanimously (except for the governor) to sell the original wildlife preserve that they’d been after to another developer. On that day, Tyree quit and disappeared from the Governor's mansion. At first, Tyree was believed kidnapped, until a notarized letter of resignation was sent to the Capitol and verified by the FBI.
He became a wild hermit, living first in Harney County (a fictional Florida county), where he adopted the name "Skink,” and was simply viewed as an eccentric, albeit a potentially violent one.
Over the years, he makes infrequent appearances over South Florida, becoming something of an urban legend.

Aug 8, 2011 11:17:10 AM, mmin...@caver.net wrote:
At 10:32 AM 8/6/2011, Mixon Bill wrote:My favoritesumming up was written by Squire Lewis on encountering Bicking inMexico after the 1966 convention: "Lew's only traveling and survivalequipment consists of a small Kelty pack whose sole contents are thelargest Spanish dictionary every printed--about a 20-pounder--and abox of Mexican crackers. . . . His only clothes are those he wears,and he obviously has some warped goal of not taking them off--ever-- for washing or any other purpose. . . . He has gotten all the long wayfrom Baltimore to California to [Mexico City] with nothing but hisgreat dictionary and his crackers. We have never seen him spend anymoney--not any--he may well not have any.That reminds me of a statement attributed, I believe, to a governor of Florida. In reference to hikers or whomever coming to visit being good for the economy, he said something like, "They come with only one pair of underwear and a five-dollar bill and don't change either."Mark MintonPlease reply to mmin...@caver.netPermanent email address is mmin...@illinoisalumni.org -Visit our website: http://texascavers.comTo unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.comFor additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com

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Re: Re: [Texascavers] book review: Lew Bicking

[Andy Gluesenkamp]

Well,
  You absolutely must read Carl Hiassen's book, Sick Puppy.  A fictional 
portayal of the guv in question plays a prominent role.
 
Andy

Andrew G. Gluesenkamp, Ph.D.
700 Billie Brooks Drive
Driftwood, Texas 78619
(512) 799-1095
a...@gluesenkamp.com

--- On Mon, 8/8/11, tbsam...@verizon.net tbsam...@verizon.net wrote:


From: tbsam...@verizon.net tbsam...@verizon.net
Subject: Re: Re: [Texascavers] book review: Lew Bicking
To: mmin...@caver.net
Cc: texascavers@texascavers.com
Date: Monday, August 8, 2011, 11:29 AM



Fla. Guvs. SKINK =  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clinton_Tyree
 

Tyree was Governor of Florida in the 1970s. He was everything desirable in a 
candidate: a native of Florida, a college football star, and a decorated 
Vietnam veteran. He was dazzlingly handsome, charismatic, and articulate. He 
was also a former English professor at the University of Florida, though 
politically most people saw this as a handicap rather than an asset.
To the surprise of the Florida establishment, he was also one of the few, if 
not the only, honest men to hold the office. After he turned down a bribe from 
real estate developers, the developers assumed he was holding out for more 
money, and came back offering a larger bribe, along with a foolproof scheme for 
concealing the money. To their astonishment, the governor not only refused 
again, but had them arrested in an F.B.I. sting.
Tyree was also vehemently opposed to runaway growth in Florida, and gained 
national recognition for his passionate speeches and legislative proposals to 
discourage tourism, curtail land development, and protect the environment. (For 
example, one of his proposed laws would have required any boat driver who 
killed a manatee to immediately forfeit his boat, pay a $10,000 fine or go to 
jail for forty-five days, and bury the dead animal himself at a public 
ceremony).
Appalled, a group of Florida special interests pooled their resources to 
neutralize the governor politically, by bribing majorities in the state cabinet 
and the legislature to ignore or reject all of his initiatives.
Years later, the executive assistant to the current governor reviews Tyree’s 
history, and marvels at the futility of his struggle:

As popular as Clinton Tyree had been with the common folk of Florida, he stood 
no chance – none whatsoever – of disabling the machinery of greed and 
converting the legislature into a body of foresight and honest ethics. It was 
boggling to think a sane person would even try.
On the same day that the crooked developers who had tried to bribe Tyree were 
convicted, but punished with nothing more than probation, the legislature voted 
unanimously (except for the governor) to sell the original wildlife preserve 
that they’d been after to another developer. On that day, Tyree quit and 
disappeared from the Governor's mansion. At first, Tyree was believed 
kidnapped, until a notarized letter of resignation was sent to the Capitol and 
verified by the FBI.
He became a wild hermit, living first in Harney County (a fictional Florida 
county), where he adopted the name Skink,” and was simply viewed as an 
eccentric, albeit a potentially violent one.
Over the years, he makes infrequent appearances over South Florida, becoming 
something of an urban legend.
 



Aug 8, 2011 11:17:10 AM, mmin...@caver.net wrote:

At 10:32 AM 8/6/2011, Mixon Bill wrote:
My favorite
summing up was written by Squire Lewis on encountering Bicking in
Mexico after the 1966 convention: Lew's only traveling and survival
equipment consists of a small Kelty pack whose sole contents are the
largest Spanish dictionary every printed--about a 20-pounder--and a
box of Mexican crackers. . . . His only clothes are those he wears,
and he obviously has some warped goal of not taking them off--ever-- 
for washing or any other purpose. . . . He has gotten all the long way
from Baltimore to California to [Mexico City] with nothing but his
great dictionary and his crackers. We have never seen him spend any
money--not any--he may well not have any.

That reminds me of a statement attributed, I believe, to a 
governor of Florida. In reference to hikers or whomever coming to 
visit being good for the economy, he said something like, They come 
with only one pair of underwear and a five-dollar bill and don't 
change either.

Mark Minton

Please reply to mmin...@caver.net
Permanent email address is mmin...@illinoisalumni.org 


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Re: [Texascavers] book review: Lew Bicking

[Alex Sproul]

Tyree was Governor of Florida in the 1970s. He was everything 
desirable in a candidate...

Not so fast, Ted!  I, for one, have read a lot of Carl Hiaasen, too, in 
which Tyree is a frequent (and wonderful) character.

Yes, you acknowledged your plagiarism with your Wikipedia link, 
but who actually follows those (or believes everything Wiki says, for 
that matter)?

Alex

--
Alex Sproul
NSS 8086RL/FE
NSS Webmaster
www.caves.org

Re: [Texascavers] book review: Lew Bicking

[Rod Goke]

Mark,You probably are thinking of the story I posted to Texascavers May 1, 2010. A copy of that message is appended as the "Forwarded Message" below. I believe that the original statement was made by a Florida state legislator instead of the governor, but your memory was close.Rod-Original Message-From: Mark Minton <mmin...@caver.net>Sent: Aug 8, 2011 11:16 AMTo: texascavers@texascavers.comSubject: Re: [Texascavers] book review: Lew BickingAt 10:32 AM 8/6/2011, Mixon Bill wrote:My favoritesumming up was written by Squire Lewis on encountering Bicking inMexico after the 1966 convention: "Lew's only traveling and survivalequipment consists of a small Kelty pack whose sole contents are thelargest Spanish dictionary every printed--about a 20-pounder--and abox of Mexican crackers. . . . His only clothes are those he wears,and he obviously has some warped goal of not taking them off--ever-- for washing or any other purpose. . . . He has gotten all the long wayfrom Baltimore to California to [Mexico City] with nothing but hisgreat dictionary and his crackers. We have never seen him spend anymoney--not any--he may well not have any. That reminds me of a statement attributed, I believe, to a governor of Florida.  In reference to hikers or whomever coming to visit being good for the economy, he said something like, "They come with only one pair of underwear and a five-dollar bill and don't change either."Mark MintonPlease reply to mmin...@caver.netPermanent email address is mmin...@illinoisalumni.org -Forwarded Message-From: Rod Goke <rod.g...@earthlink.net>Sent: May 1, 2010 6:47 AMTo: texascavers@texascavers.comSubject: Re: Traveling with $5 per personBack when Texas cavers and hippies were visiting Mexico with only $5 per person, I was a caver and graduate student in Florida. At that time, some backpacking enthusiasts were trying to get the State to build more hiking trails and were trying to win support for the project by suggesting that it would help Florida's economy by attracting more tourists. At least one state legislator, however, was not impressed with this argument, and he made headlines by saying, "The average backpacker comes to the State with one pair of underwear and a $5 bill, and he never changes either."Not many Florida cavers traveled to Mexico, since most of us couldn't afford to travel that far, but during breaks, we often went caving in the TAG (Tennessee/Alabama/Georgia) region on similarly cheap travel budgets. Sometimes we'd camp in tents, but for only 25 cents per night per person (dropped into an unsupervised coin jar via the honor system), we could stay at the TAG House, an old semi-abandoned farm house with one light bulb, one wood/coal burning stove, and no plumbing. At other times we negotiated a deal with a certain cheap motel in Alabama, where we could rent 1 or 2 rooms for a week or more with no sheets or towels and with no limit on how many cavers could share a room. Sometimes we'd pack so many cavers into a room that the motel actually cost us less per person than the TAG House!   Cheapskate travels weren't just in Mexico. Cavers found ways to travel cheaply wherever we went back then.Rod-Original Message-From: Mark Minton <mmin...@caver.net>Sent: Apr 30, 2010 3:09 PMTo: texascavers@texascavers.comSubject: [Texascavers] Re:  Mexican paperwork It is true that back in the 70s or thereabouts tourists were sometimes asked to prove that they had enough money to survive during their stay in Mexico.  The amount needed was not specified and seemed to be up to the admitting customs official to decide.  The problem for cavers who were camping out in the mountains was that we needed far less cash than the average tourist, so it sometimes seemed like we didn't have enough.  On at least one trip I was on when this was a problem, we pooled our money and gave it all to one person, who then went through the line and got his permit.  Then he gave the cash to the next person, etc.  It took a bit longer, but we all got through with the same wad of cash.  :-)Mark MintonAt 02:22 PM 4/30/2010, Gill Edigar wrote:On Fri, Apr 30, 2010 at 12:18 PM, Fofo <gonza...@msu.edu> wrote:...so I guess that now when getting a visa for Mexico people are better off having some credit card or bank statements and pay stubs.Mixon Bill wrote, on 30/4/10 9:54 :That wouldhave been entertaining back in the old days of Mexican caving (thesixties), when eight hippi gringo cavers in one truck with $5 cash eachwould head into Mexico to look for pits.The $5 story is true. On at least one occasion I went to Bustamante for a long weekend with only 5 bucks in my pocket--and came back with change. In those days $40 in cash was 'proof of solvency'. I would guess that 300 or 400 dollars would do the trick today--for a short trip at least. For a 180-day permit (I must repeat that they are not visas) it would be hard to carry several thous

Re: [Texascavers] book review: Lew Bicking

[Mark Minton]

At 10:32 AM 8/6/2011, Mixon Bill wrote:

My favorite
summing up was written by Squire Lewis on encountering Bicking in
Mexico after the 1966 convention: Lew's only traveling and survival
equipment consists of a small Kelty pack whose sole contents are the
largest Spanish dictionary every printed--about a 20-pounder--and a
box of Mexican crackers. . . . His only clothes are those he wears,
and he obviously has some warped goal of not taking them off--ever-- 
for washing or any other purpose. . . . He has gotten all the long way

from Baltimore to California to [Mexico City] with nothing but his
great dictionary and his crackers. We have never seen him spend any
money--not any--he may well not have any.


That reminds me of a statement attributed, I believe, to a 
governor of Florida.  In reference to hikers or whomever coming to 
visit being good for the economy, he said something like, They come 
with only one pair of underwear and a five-dollar bill and don't 
change either.


Mark Minton

Please reply to mmin...@caver.net
Permanent email address is mmin...@illinoisalumni.org 



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