texascavers Digest 14 Mar 2012 14:56:47 -0000 Issue 1514
Topics (messages 19707 through 19712):
NSS Director's Election
19707 by: R D Milhollin
Phantom Springs Cave
19708 by: Lee H. Skinner
USDA Soil Survey App
19709 by: germanyj.aol.com
Texas Land Trends
19710 by: germanyj.aol.com
Remember the guy that killed the bats on TV?
19711 by: R D Milhollin
Avery Ranch Cave Preserve in the news
19712 by: Aimee Beveridge
Administrivia:
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[Forwarded]
The 2012 Director Election will begin on March 15th and conclude on May 1.
Eligible members with a valid e-mail address on file with the NSS
Office will receive an e-mail from Vote-Now.com with instructions for
how to vote online. Members without a valid e-mail address on file
with the NSS Office will receive a postcard with instructions for how
to vote online or how to request a paper ballot.
What can members do to help?
1) Vote online, if possible, to save money for the NSS.
2) Vote right away--don't put it off--to avoid a reminder that will
cost more money to the NSS.
3) Print out candidate platforms--study them and pass them along to
folks without Internet access.
4) Offer to let folks use your computer to vote if they aren't connected.
Web Pages:
Nominating Committee Home slate of candidates and general information
http://www.caves.org/committee/nominating/index.shtml
Candidate Platforms Candidate Platforms in HTML
http://www.caves.org/committee/nominating/Pages/Platforms2012.htm
Candidate Platforms in.pdf version
http://www.caves.org/committee/nominating/Downloads/2012%20Platforms.pdf
Paperless Election FAQ
http://www.caves.org/committee/nominating/Pages/PaperlessBallotFAQ.htm
Any questions? Contact:
Allan Weberg, Chairman
NSS Nominating Committee
[email protected]
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New story on KBTX.com:
http://tinyurl.com/6syqdx8
Lee Skinner
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USDA Creates Smartphone App to Access Soil Survey Information
The USDA recently launched, SoilWeb, a new smartphone application that
combines online soil survey information with the GPS capabilities of both
iPhones and Androids. The app is a portable version of the USDA's Natural
Resources Conservation Service's Web Soil Survey.
The mobile tool will be beneficial to engineers, developers, farmers and many
others who are working in the field.
Some of the features include retrieving graphic summaries of soil types based
on user queries and user-friendly narratives of soil conditions.
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New Tool Helps Texans Understand State's Changing Dynamic Land Use
The Texas A&M Institute of Renewable Natural Resources and the American
Farmland Trust have developed a new tool to help Texans better understand land
trends.
Texas Land Trends highlights changes, including land use, property size, land
type and loss of agricultural lands. The information is searchable by county,
watershed, ecoregion and metro area. The information is also available on a
statewide basis.
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--- Begin Message ---
The bats got the
last laugh...
------------------------------------------------
'Man vs. Wild' star Bear Grylls fired by TV
network
LOS ANGELES | Tue Mar 13, 2012 7:05pm
EDT
(Reuters) - Bear Grylls, the British adventurer and
star of survival show "Man vs. Wild", has been fired by U.S. cable television
network Discovery Channel in a contract dispute.
Grylls, 37, who was dropped into hostile places to
survive by eating insects, wading rapids and drinking his urine, has hosted the
TV show since 2006, becoming a celebrity around the world.
But Discovery Channel said on Tuesday that "due to
a continuing contractual dispute with Bear Grylls, Discovery has terminated all
current productions with him."
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/03/13/entertainment-us-beargrylls-idUSBRE82C1FO20120313
(previously) From Bat Conservation
International:
A recent episode of Discovery Channel’s Man vs.
Wild featured Bear Grylls
gleefully killing bats with a homemade club. The
clip, which shows Grylls
throwing a flame in a cave to “smoke out” the bats,
swatting them to the
ground and then stomping on them, has aired
internationally and been
posted on YouTube, allowing for continued
access.
(Update: Since this article was published, the
video has been removed from YouTube).
Intentionally or not, this clip perpetuates
negative attitudes toward bats and could generate senseless copycat activity
and/or the type of vandalism that is driving many bat species to the brink of
extinction. Only four months ago, a Kentucky man was sentenced to eight months
in jail after pleading guilty to beating to death 105 endangered Indiana
bats.
(forwarded from Matt Bowers on NSSWest)
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http://www.statesman.com/news/williamson/sensitive-williamson-county-cavern-systems-feed-salamanders-springs-2236277.html
Nestled in a three-lot patch of land in the middle of the Avery Ranch
neighborhood is a concrete and metal hatch the entrance and only sign of an
ancient, dripping cave of glistening caramel-colored, calcite-covered limestone
beneath.
Hundreds of similar karst caverns — 750 in Williamson County alone — honeycomb
the Central Texas landscape. Water from the ground above seeps through the
soil, drips down the walls of the caves and into the Edwards Aquifer. It then
empties through springs back into creeks and streams on the surface.
"It's all connected," said Mike Walsh, president of the Texas Cave Conservancy,
which owns the Avery Ranch land that covers the cave.
Avery Ranch Cave feeds water to springs that are home to the Jollyville
salamander — a candidate for the endangered species list and a source of
tension between Williamson County officials, federal officials and
environmental groups.
One such spring nearby is home to a "healthy" population of the critters, an
official said Tuesday.
Walsh and other officials were in far Northwest Austin at the cave Tuesday as
part of a city-sponsored event promoting Groundwater Awareness Week. More than
50,000 Austin residents rely on groundwater, city officials said. Most cities
in Williamson County provide residents a mix of groundwater and surface water,
according to a representative for the Brazos River Authority, which serves much
of the county.
The Avery Ranch cavern was closed off for thousands of years before a crew
attempting to put in sewer lines discovered it in 2001. The U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service then granted the cave conservancy a contract to develop the
site as an educational show cave. It's open to the public twice a year; April
14 is the next day for visitors.
Walsh's group helps maintain caves for entities that include Cedar Park, the
Brushy Creek Municipal Utility District and the Williamson County Conservation
Foundation.
"Cedar Park is very critical to the watershed," Walsh said. He explained that
water that enters one Cedar Park cave system — the roughly 1-square-mile
Buttercup Creek watershed — flows through a series of underground streams and
then surfaces in springs in the Volente area.
Those springs feed Cypress Creek, which flows into Lake Travis, from which much
of Austin gets its water, Walsh said.
Water from Avery Ranch Cave also feeds a dozen springs in the area, several of
which are home to the Jollyville salamander — one of two species of salamander
that call the county home.
Officials have been fighting the potential endangered species listing, arguing
the county can maintain the species without federal regulation, which they fear
will inhibit development in the ever-growing county.
One spring, at the Avery Ranch Golf Course, supports a healthy population of
salamanders, said Sylvia Pope, a hydrogeologist for the city. She said the
public golf course is irrigated with water from Brushy Creek and has a pest
management system that's actually helped the ecosystem.
"Avery Ranch has done a great job," Pope said.
Laurie Dries, a salamander biologist at the City of Austin, said salamanders
are important because they are good indicators of water quality.
"This whole karst aquifer system is a sensitive system because water runs
through it so quickly," Dries said. "Those species are adapted to live in that
environment, so how they're doing tells us a lot about the water."
The city is promoting Groundwater Awareness Week to remind residents to use
"green" gardening habits — such as using natural compost, as opposed to
chemical-heavy fertilizers — and emphasize that residents should clean up
messes, from motor oil to dog waste, said Wendy Morgan of the city's
groundwater protection department.
"All of that moves through these rocks and becomes part of the groundwater."
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