Caves

What is a Cave?

Caves are natural underground holes, large enough for a human to enter. They usually do not receive sunlight.

There are many different types of caves. There are primary caves, lava tubes, sea caves, corrosional caves and errosional caves, solution caves, and glacier caves.

Caves are used for shelter, burial tombs, gold digging, coal mining, and caving.

A long time ago, people drew pictures to tell their stories and pass on history on cave walls.

Caves can be a small opening to a very long passage that's miles long.

Caves can be as simple as a bunch of rocks, to as delicate and beautiful as a collection of crystals as far as the eye can se..

Caves are fascinating and make me want to know more about them.

Exploring

Caves

Extreme Caves

One way caves are extreme is how they're made. Caves are usually formed by a chemical reaction where carbonic acid seeps through limestone to make a cave.

The carbonic acid drips to form stalactites and stlagmites.

Lava tubes are formed by lava melting rock to form tube-like caves.

Caves are one of the least explored places on earth.

However, they actually cover 10% of the earth.

The longest cave system is in Mammoth Cave Park, which is 591 km long.

The largest sea cave is over 100 miles long and the deepest cave is in Abkhazia, Georgia at 2,191 meters deep.

Many people don't think about caves because we don't see them, but they are really awesome once you get to discover them.

Spelunking in

Tight Spots

What Caves Teach Me About God

Learning about caves and the animals that live in them show God's awesome creativity.

He's creative even in the places most people won't see, like in the smallest cracks in the earth.

I learned that even in rough places, there are animals God made who can still survive.

The beauty of ice crystals in primary caves are really amazing.

It's cool that the Dead Sea Scrolls were found in caves and they helped us learn about the Bible.

Caves are mentioned in the Bible 44 times.

Learning about caves showed me more about God.

God's

Creation

in Caves

Me in a man made cave at Thunder

Mountain in Disneyland

On the

Indiana Jones Ride

in Disneyland

Caves and Canada

There are many interesting caves in Canada.

Most of the large caves, best for exploring, are actually found in BC.

The largest is called Arctomys Cave, in the BC Rockies. It is 536 meters deep and 3496 meters wide.

There are 76 known and recorded huge caves in Canada, and almost all of them are found in British Columbia.

Spelunking has become a tourist attraction in B.C. because caving is getting more popular and we have many caves to explore.

The British Columbia Cave Rescue Organization was formed in 1984. They train people and have special equipment to help the RCMP rescue people lost in caves.

Canada loves caves.

Troglobites

• Troglobites are cave-dwelling creatures

A troglobite is an animal or fish such as a salamander or a spider or a crab.

Some troglobites can live up to 200 years and scientists have found a crab that was 175 years old.

The reason they can live so long is because they have such a low metabolism.

Another cool thing is that they have no eyes and they can still live perfectly normally without them.

They can live without very much oxygen and with no food for long periods of time.

This is what I've learned about troglobites.

Technology and Equipment

Technology and equipment have helped us a lot in exploring caves.

If you were going potholing (cave exploring) in a sea cave, you would need scuba gear. You will need an oxygen tank in order to go that deep.

To explore a primary cave, you would want to bring along a head-mounted light and a hard hat, as well as protective boots to guide you and help you along in the extreme environment.

You would need a rope and a rope ladder to make sure you can get back out of the cave.

You'd also need a parachute in order to jump into some caves.

A gas mask is important, because there will be some areas with bad oxygen.

Technology and equipment is very important for spelunking.

Important

Equipment

Gas

Mask +

Head Light

Scuba

Gear

Bibliography

Discoveries in the Dark, National Geographic ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2007/09

Interesting Facts About Caves, Strange-Facts.info

www.strange-facts.info/interesting-facts-about-caves

Dead Sea Scrolls, Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/dead-sea-scrolls

Planet Earth, 2006

Cole, Magic School Bus: Inside the Earth

Cave Wallpaper:

http://wallpapers-area.blogspot.com/2011/01/beautiful-lighting-cave-wallpaper.html

Beautiful Cave View:

http://www.designswan.com/archives/9-beautiful-cave-view-in-the-world.html

Photo of Astyanax jordani:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Astyanax_jordani.jpg

Photo of Anguinus:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:P_anguinus-head1.jpg

Photo of Leptodirus Hochenwartii:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Leptodirus_hochenwartii.jpg

Scuba Photo:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Leptodirus_hochenwartii.jpg

Equipment Image:

http://www.bostongrotto.org/Grotto/pix/basic_equipment.jpeg

Headlamp image:

http://www.geol.lsu.edu/aengel/images/DCP_9007.JPG

Caving Teqhniques: Spelunking Through Tight Spaces,

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWbWOJMEZ8Y&feature=fvw

Spelunking in Marakoopa Caves, Tasmania,

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTLy7-gjV1M

British Columbia Cave Rescue,

http://www.cancaver.ca/bccr/index.htm

Canada's Deepest Caves,

http://eyespybc.tripod.com/darksideonlinetabloid/id3.html

Crystal Cave, http://www.flixya.com/photo/1739198/Crystal-Cave

The

End