Carroll Cave Trip Report – 25 January 2025

Time in = 0950, time out = 14:45

Participants – Bill Gee (Trip leader)
Martin Carmichael
Rita Worden
Marty Griffin
Jerel Waters
Mike Kovacs
Candace Kovacs

This is one of the semi-annual data logger service trips. In January every year I download all data from all loggers, then use that data to prepare full-year graphs of data for the previous year.

The trip this year was originally planned for January 4. A storm came through late that day which resulted in icy roads. We could have made it to the cave with no problem, but getting home would have required ice skates. Friday morning we canceled the trip and rescheduled for January 25.

I drove down early morning, arriving at the cave at 7:30 am. The weather was clear but rather cold, about 18F when I arrived. I had no problem with either of the combination locks being frozen. The lockbox inside the silo was frozen and would not open. I carry a small propane heater which I set on the lockbox. In about ten minutes it thawed enough to open. The lanyard on the key was still frozen solid. I opened the hatch and rigged the rope.

The first logger to get downloaded is the rain gauge hanging on the silo. That went with no problem. Martin Carmichael arrived about 8:00am with his new dog Ginger. She is a friendly beast. Martin adopted her less than 2 days before.

The last arrival was at 9:10am. By then the sun was up and keeping the inside of vehicles fairly warm. We had one person who did not show up. She came down with flu Friday evening and was not up to a trip. We did not find that out until later. When 9:40 arrived, we decided to go with the people we had.

The first person was down the shaft at 9:50. We were all in the cave by 10:15. Jerel Waters was on his very first trip in Carroll Cave, so I showed him where the loggers are and what the process is for downloading them. I also placed a refreshed cave intrusion detector.

We headed down Carroll Passage to get data from the logger near the Rimstone Room. We arrived there at 10:45. A few people went on to show Jerel the Water Barrier and the big rimstones. Returning to the ladder went fast. We were back a few minutes after 11:00 to have lunch.

After lunch we started upstream Thunder River to get data from the logger in UL2. The trip went a bit slowly because we were counting so many fish. I downloaded the logger at 12:50. We stopped at the formation areas on the way out so Jerel could get a look. Candace managed to get a very nice photo of the cave pearls.

The return trip was much faster. We were back at the ladder about 1:30. Several people peeled off to climb out while Rita, Jerel, Marty and I went on to Thunder Falls. I downloaded the data logger located in the pool a hundred feet downstream of the waterfall. We were back at the ladder about 1:50. We geared up and climbed out. Last person out of the cave at 2:15.

After changing to clean clothes and locking up the cave, five of us went to El Caporal in Camdenton for early dinner.

Biota counts:

Fish – Ladder to UL2 = 83
In UL2 = 23

Bats = 1, probably a tricolor, in Upper Thunder passage.

Salamanders = 3, two juveniles and one adult grotto in UL2, three grotto at the ladder

Isopods = 25, most of them on one rock that Martin turned over.

Crickets = 3 at the ladder