Trip Reports
Blue Springs Photo Trip
I was suprised by an email from Bruce Minkin on Wednesday March 17, 2010 wanting to know if I would be interested in a quick photo trip to Blue Springs Cave in Sparta, TN on Saturday. Well....it took all of five seconds for me to make up my mind to tag along on this one. I have been wanting to get into Blue Springs for years. Bruce is an old friend of the owner of the cave and has been there many times. Lonie, the owner had messed up his knee somehow and Bruce being an orthopedic surgeon had a brace for Lonie once we got there.
It ended up being just Bruce, his son Alex, and myself from Asheville with Bruce's brother David and his son Patton. Kind of a family affair. David and Patton had driven in from Memphis that morning. As we started through the "tourist entrance" I could kinda tell that David was in no shape to do much in the way of caving since he was huffing and puffing just walking up to the cave. And indeed, he wanted to leave after 15 min or so. At this point, Bruce took David back top side while Alex, Patton, and myself went on to the formation area. It was too bad to because David was a professional photographer and I was hoping to get some tips from him. Bruce quickly caught back up with us and we spent the next four hours in just two rooms taking pictures. After a quick 20 min hike back out of the cave, we caught back up with David.
After a fine Mexican dinner in downtown Sparta with Lonie and his family we trecked back to Asheville getting in at 3:00 in the morning. A good time was had by all! Pete Kirchner
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Blowing Springs Bat Survey
On Thursday Feb. 10, 2010, Scott McCrea and I assisted NC Fish and Wildlife with bat counts at Blowing Spring Cave. Having never been to the cave before, it was a rare treat to go. Also it was nice to cave in one of North Carolinas few solutional caves. We met up with Gaberiel Grater, Chris Mcgrath, another NC Fish and Wildlife person that morning to travel to the cave to begin work. Blowing Springs Cave has a nice little entrance up a large hill from the road. It is well gated, and provides nice habitat for the bats hibernating there. We entered the cave and begun work. Scott and i assisted them in traversing throught the cave and with the vertical work ahead. Many bats were counted that day. There totals were over 1500, but i believe it is well over 2000 bats in that cave due to places that are not easily accessable to count. The large room at the back hosted the most bats, well over 1000. I learned to correctly iedntify bats that i had been miss identifying for quite some time. I learned that bats like cooler caves for hivernation. Around 45 to 50 deg. Blowing Springs is definitely cooler, one of the coldest i have been in. Got to see a pair of bats mate as well. Now that is something you dont see every day! All and all, it was a good day, New friends made with the guys and Gal's from Fish and Wildlife. One safe caving trip completed and an awsome cave filled with WNS FREE! bats. John Christie
- reeffish1073's blog
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