Club Conservation

[cap n chris]

CSCC started active involvement with the English Nature SSSI Cave Monitoring scheme WAY back in 2003. All the files are available. Just haven't got a fancy pants website.

"The Peak District SSSI Cave Conservation Monitoring Scheme, to give it its full title, was set up in 2002"

See http://www.orpheuscavingclub.org.uk/links.html (not a fancy pants website)

LOL!

:bow:

 

[ZombieCake]

Last Descent had some adopt a cave entry, not sure off the relevance.

 

[bograt]

I notice with interest the lack of any mention of Regional Bodies in this poll, DCA has removed many tons of detritus from many holes in the region, mainly by a group calling themselves the 'Coffin Dodgers', a bunch made up mainly of elderly members from various clubs and who should be deserving of a commendation in the field of cave conservation.

 

[cap n chris]

DCA has removed many tons of detritus from many holes in the region, mainly by a group calling themselves the 'Coffin Dodgers', a bunch made up mainly of elderly members from various clubs and who should be deserving of a commendation in the field of cave conservation.

Fully agree.

 

[kay]

I notice with interest the lack of any mention of Regional Bodies in this poll, DCA has removed many tons of detritus from many holes in the region, mainly by a group calling themselves the 'Coffin Dodgers', a bunch made up mainly of elderly members from various clubs and who should be deserving of a commendation in the field of cave conservation.

The "Little Green Men" in the Dales have a similar age profile. Is this a general trend, that older cavers are more involved in conservation? Or better at advertising themselves  How does the age profile of cavers active in conservation match the age profile of cavers in general?

 

[paul]

I notice with interest the lack of any mention of Regional Bodies in this poll, DCA has removed many tons of detritus from many holes in the region, mainly by a group calling themselves the 'Coffin Dodgers', a bunch made up mainly of elderly members from various clubs and who should be deserving of a commendation in the field of cave conservation.

The "Little Green Men" in the Dales have a similar age profile. Is this a general trend, that older cavers are more involved in conservation? Or better at advertising themselves  How does the age profile of cavers active in conservation match the age profile of cavers in general?

I would imagine that being retired allows more time to carry out these worthy activities.

 

[Leclused]

In a previous post I mentioned the protection by Law (national/international) as part of a conservation

The following link shows how the cave "Grotte des Emotions" is internationally protected by  Ramsar (wetland).

http://www.ramsar.org/grotte-des-emotions

The same cave is also nationally protected by CSIS

http://environnement.wallonie.be/csis/Aspnet/index.aspx?idPage=csis&page=principal&id=249

 

[kay]

I notice with interest the lack of any mention of Regional Bodies in this poll, DCA has removed many tons of detritus from many holes in the region, mainly by a group calling themselves the 'Coffin Dodgers', a bunch made up mainly of elderly members from various clubs and who should be deserving of a commendation in the field of cave conservation.

The "Little Green Men" in the Dales have a similar age profile. Is this a general trend, that older cavers are more involved in conservation? Or better at advertising themselves  How does the age profile of cavers active in conservation match the age profile of cavers in general?

I would imagine that being retired allows more time to carry out these worthy activities.

Being retired allows more time for any activity, worthy or otherwise.  One could theoretically have a situation where all the retired cavers spent their entire free time caving, whereas the working age cavers spent half their time caving and half their time doing conservation.

 

[bagpuss]

We are proactive in terms of mentioning all the important points to newcomers & I know club members who tidy up mines. In terms of cave conservation (aside from picking up rubbish as we go) how would a club go about getting involved with more of this side of things? I'd be more than willing to help out, but would have no idea who to approach.

A starting point might be the Conservation Officer of your local access body - CNCC, CSCC, DCA etc. If you're caving in the Dales, pm me.

Our club is Bristol based, so cave on Mendip, will contact the CSCC officer. It would be useful though if more info was available online in terms of what clubs can do to help.

I did contact, but didn't get a response.

 

[cap n chris]

PM sent 

Southern Professional and Conservation Cavers might be able to get you involved in something!

 

[cap n chris]

A year has elapsed since this thread was initiated and the poll seemed to conclude that around 60% of caving clubs were proactive in terms of conservation either via education or direct works.

It would be heartening to have some feedback of what these 60% have done during the ensuing 12 months.

Here's some to start off with:

SPCC - taping, mending
UBSS - Conservation induction
ACI -  education

 

[Leclused]

A year has elapsed since this thread was initiated and the poll seemed to conclude that around 60% of caving clubs were proactive in terms of conservation either via education or direct works.

It would be heartening to have some feedback of what these 60% have done during the ensuing 12 months.

Here's some to start off with:

SPCC - taping, mending
UBSS - Conservation induction
ACI -  education

Sc Avalon (Belgium) - further clean-up in Grotte St-Anne. No taping actions due to lack of new discoveries   But we are working hard in some projects in Belgium and France.
- Reopening of one of the entrances of Chantoir des Fagnoules (one of our biggest discoveries) which became blocked after a landslide during last winter.

 

[Pitlamp]

Not sure why you've singled out clubs

Because BCA is drafting new conservation codes which it will be sending out to clubs and the obvious question is "will clubs forward the codes to their members?". i.e. will the leaflets be effective in their goal?

That may depend on the quality of the codes. I've seen well meaning cave conservation codes in the past which have included bad advice, based on ignorance. Here's one example, of many I could quote. We have been told by such codes formerly that active streamways are less vulnerable than abandoned passages. Whoever told us that has probably never dived a downstream sump in a popular stream cave, otherwise they'd have seen all the rubbish which can accumulate in such lower energy environments. But that's still an "active streamway". Just because that part of a cave system is seldom visited doesn't mean it's any less valuable.

Another thought; many individuals in clubs (and groups of individuals) play very active roles in cave conservation and do much excellent work. To what extent should that be considered a "club" activity? Such questions reveal the dangers in reading too much into "surveys" such as this.

Does it really matter if clubs don't have conservation written into paperwork provided these clubs maintain a good conservation ethos?

The bottom line is that our many caving clubs in the UK do a great deal to promote and actively intervene in cave conservation and deserve a great deal of credit for this.

By the way, I applaud the OP for what is clearly an admirable effort to raise the profile of cave conservation. I also applaud the BCA for their efforts with any new initiatives in the area of cave conservation, including updating codes.

 

[Jenny P]

Note that BCA has now published a leaflet "Minimal Impact Caving Guidelines" which has been drawn up by conservation officers from all the regions working together with the help of the BCA Conservation & Access Committee.  These guidelines are a great deal more sensible than the codes issued in earlier years and the idea is to try to encourage clubs to make copies of the code available to their members and to put the downloadable version on their club websites.

The Guidelines are available from the BCA website:  british-caving.org.uk  so please have a look and download them for yourself.  A great deal of thought is being put into encouraging cavers to take more care of their caves and these guidelines and the leaflet are just one of a number of initiatives to try to improve the situation.

However, printed leaflets are only a first step - education of new members by the clubs they first join will be important in changing the ethos to put cave conservation first and foremost among cavers.  There are many dedicated people who do a great deal of work in all sorts of ways towards cave conservation but it now needs a real push by all of us to get the message across.

 

[Pitlamp]

An excellent post, Jenny.

 

[Cookie]

The Guidelines are available from the BCA website:  british-caving.org.uk  so please have a look and download them for yourself. 

See http://british-caving.org.uk/wiki3/doku.php?id=conservation_access:start

 

[Pitlamp]

Just going back to the OP's question - not sure if this has been mentioned yet - but the admirable Descent "Adopt A Cave" scheme is essentially a club based initiative.

I'm in two major northern clubs; when I added my vote I was thinking of one in particular (which had members helping on an Ease Gill clean up in Autumn, agreed at a committee meeting). But the other club included a formal meet this summer specifically to do conservation work in a well known Ribblesdale cave. Presumably I can't vote twice, so just saying.