Jamican Caves Organisation Update
We're making progress on the government paperwork for the guano sampling project, which will begin March 4. The JCO would like to thank Mr. Peter Knight, CEO of NEPA, for getting things underway.
There will be a field visit to the Cockpit Country later in the week. There is also a tentative plan to visit Schwallenburgh Cave on the weekend, which is one of the guano sampling sites.
(Jan 1/12)
The JCO ended off the year with a visit to St Clair Cave on December 31 to continue work on completing the route out the third entrance, which was discovered by Stewart earlier in 2011. More bolts still need to be placed, but we're slowly getting there.
(Dec 25/11)
Merry Christmas to everyone from the Jamaican Caves Organisation. Bless up, and Jah guide. (And for those familiar with Jamaican politrix, the temporary green bar in the header is for Christmas - it matches the red links well.)
(Dec 23/11)
The election in Jamaica is now less than a week away. We hope that whatever party wins, the Comrades or the Labourites, they will remember the importance of Jamaica's environment, and its peoples place in it.
There is more to this country than opportunities to scoop dollars in backroom deals with Trafigura, the Chinese, and UCRusal, while maintaining bases in foreign. There is more to be done than tossing around dollars at election time that will be mostly spent on Cashpot and set-ups. If the current politicians have no real loyalty to our future, they should pass the torch to those who do.
(Dec 17/11)
We've chopped out last year's section of the News into Archives - Volume 9, linked at the bottom of this page, to speed up the load time.
Please be advised that the Barbecue Bottom road, in the eastern Cockpit Country, is currently blocked by very large fallen rocks toward the Burnt Hill end, a situation that will probably persist for some time to come.
(Dec 7/11)
Yesterdays' visit to Thatchfield went well, and traffic at the site appears to continue to be low. A nice photo of formations in the cave has been posted on the website in high resolution (click on the photo beside this item).
(Dec 5/11)
We'll be making a brief visit to Thatchfield Cave tomorrow for monitoring.
(Nov 27/11)
The first week back in the field has been spent setting things up, and taking care of paperwork. Later this week, we'll be underground again at Schwallenburgh Cave, which is one of the three sites where we'll be sampling guano for palaeo records in February 2012. The team will probably consist of Stefan, Jan, and Damion. Soon after, we'll have a more social outing at an easier site where we can include some of the people who have recently expressed interest in joining the group.
Fieldwork resumes tomorrow.
(Nov 7/11)
The News page has been tweaked, again, to a permanent 1024px width, rather than being fluid from 750 to 1024 as it was before (most of you won't notice the change). That gets rid of the javascript for IE, which we were never happy with. We've also changed the main page, the photo/video page, the funding page and a couple of others to 1024.
Also, we've never mentioned it (been there for years) - there's at least one "easter egg" on the website. Search around on this page a little and you might find something interesting.
(Nov 5/11)
The next session of fieldwork will begin November 20, 2011, run until Christmas, and then resume indefinitely on January 2, 2012. The priority list includes the third entrance of St Clair Cave, Worthy Park Cave-3, New Green Cave, New Hall Cave, Morgans Pond Hole (for water sampling), diving at Moneague Blue Hole with our Belgian bredren (in February), guano coring at Schwallenburgh Cave with Dr Fenton, and the completion of the georeferencing of the many caves at Jackson's Bay.
More to follow.
(Nov 3/11)
We might have managed to move the medium resolution copy of our segment of "Anthony Bourdain - No Reservations - Jamaica" to the server, although we're not sure. It took 12 hours on dial-up, and stopped/resumed a number of times. The file may be corrupted. If you've got high-speed (it's a 100 MB MPG), have a look (right-click and save), see if it works, and if not, let us know at info@jamaicancaves.org.
(Nov 2/11)
Representatives of the Cockpit Country Stakeholders Group, which includes the JCO, met recently with Minister Chang regarding the Cockpit Country boundary, and plans to mine what is the last wilderness area in Jamaica for bauxite (aluminum ore). We've updated the Cockpit Country mining page with a bit of information on what transpired.
We also tweaked the format of the News page a little - the header was tiling, and should now render at 1024 px without doing so.
Our attempts to move the Bourdain file to the server have been fruitless. It looks like it will have to wait a few weeks until Stef has his 4G back. Wha' fi do.
We do have something positive to report, though - Dr Brock Fenton has informed us that the funding has come through for the guano coring project. The data derived should supply information on palaeoecological conditions, including changes in the chiropteran (bat) species make-up in the studied caves, and insect fauna in the foraging areas (we hypothesise a marked change in the early colonization period). We'll post more on this as things go ahead.
(Oct 25/11)
The site admin, Stefan, has stumbled across the long-lost original DVD of the Bourdain show (with the JCO segment at St Clair Cave), received from the production company in 2008. The only copy currently on the website is a low-res version on the photo-video page. We're attempting to get a med-res version sent up, but Stef is back on dial-up for a few weeks, and it's proving to be a challenge (110 MB file for our segment, and the upload keeps timing out). He'll try again tonight. Once back to high-speed mid-November, he'll put the entire thing online - there's an interesting last segment that didn't air, called insert/snap-in (whatever that means).
(Oct 20/11)
As mentioned earlier in the News, the publishers of an upcoming Jamaican textbook asked if they could use one of our photos, the picture of Mark Bellinger descending into the lighthole entrance of Thatchfield Cave, January, 2004, which is on the main page of our website in a low resolution version. We told them not a problem, of course, and forwarded the full resolution version. We used the same photo at full resolution some years ago in a poster that we printed up and dropped off at places like Miss Lilly's in Coxheath, but we've never posted it on the website. We're doing so now. Anyone who would like to copy and print it, or publish it themselves, is welcome to. We ask only that you keep it intact, and don't alter it any way.
We're taking a brief hiatus from fieldwork for the next few weeks, but expect to be back at things mid-November. In the interim, we'll try to catch up on website work (reports, more maps, post videos, chop out part of the News to another archive page, update the cave database, etc), and we'll attend to email more regularly. As always, we welcome reports of unexplored caves, invitations to assist in speleo research, requests for advice on caving in Jamaica, and questions on anything you think might be in our field of expertise.
Fieldwork
We've posted a report for the work done with Nina Veselka at St Clair Cave, and environs, during the last week of August, as well as a video (36MB WMV). While we were at it, we've cross-linked nine of the ten reports for the cave that have gone online since 2006. The last will be taken care of in the next few days.
We've also posted the report for Black Hill Cave-2 (coordinates removed) done on September 25, pro bono, for TPDCO.
(Sep 30/11)
The interview with TVJ went fairly well on Wednesday. A copy can be found on their website.
(Sep 26/11)
Jan and Stefan of the JCO will be on TVJ's program, Smile Jamaica, this Wednesday morning. It's live TV, so we'll be on our best behaviour.
We were in the field with TPDCO on Saturday assessing a site in Portland, Black Hill Cave-2. A report was sent to them yesterday that might appear on the website in an edited form soon.
We'd like to thank the Gleaner for a mention in an article recently, and extend an invitation to the reporter concerned to join us in a visit to a cave when schedules permit.
We recently noticed that our Press Release for Hutchinsons Hole, February 2004, is doing very well in Google for search suggestions of "jamaican". Why, we do not know, but after reading it ourselves again for the first time in years, we thought we should bring it to the attention of our visitors in case they might like to read it themselves.
(Sep 1/11)
Our apologies for the lack of News updates lately, but the site admin has been rather busy. Fieldwork has been going on, though, most recently with two bat researchers at St Clair Cave for a number of days last week. A report will be posted very soon. Also, we've supplied information and photos to the Observer for an upcoming article, been listed as the referral agency for caves by the Jamaican Natural Heritage Trust, and agreed to supply photos for a Jamaican school textbook.
A video for the Tydixon Ratbat Cave visit (60 MB WMV) done by Jan is on the server, plus a report for Sand Hole Gully Cave that also has some video (20 MB WMV) done by Stef (lower-res camera).
The web admin, RS Stewart, has fixed the Tydixon report - the template that was used, Grierfield, still had Grierfield Cave as the site name.
(Jul 18/11)
A brief report for the June 25 visit to Tydixon Ratbat Cave has been put online. Also, Jan has put up two more videos, Thatchfield Great Cave - Part 1 - June 30, 2011 (72 MB WMV), Thatchfield Great Cave - Part 2 - June 30, 2011 (58 MB WMV).
A return to St Clair Cave to finish the third entrance is on the agenda for later this week.
(Jul 4/11)
Elizabeth Slack was with us for the last week, and good work was done. A brief synopsis follows:
We are now certain that there is a third entrance to St Cair Cave. The final chamber was bolted part way up before we ran out of time, and in the course of it, we saw the sun shining into an opening above. A return to set the final bolts that will allow us to reach it is high priority - this will take place in the immediate future. A video of the outing (59 MB WMV) has been put on the server.
Two more caves in Worthy Park were located: Gullyhead Cave, and Sand Hole Gully Cave. Both are resurgences on the west side of Lluidas Vale.
Potoo Hole, Jackson's Bay, was visited for monitoring and photography of the Taino pictograms at the bottom of the entrance shaft.
Thatchfield Great Cave was visited for monitoring and video documentation.
On Saturday, June 25, Tydixon Ratbat Cave was visited with Gordon Clarke, Gregory Worton, and Peter Worton. The local mosquitoes were present in full force on the hike in, and were only left behind once we were about 30 meters into the cave. At that point, fungus gnats took over, and it was only by the use of masks that we were able to continue. Tydixon may be a very important site biologically, but it certainly isn't easy to enter and travel through.
The next of the Worthy Park caves, Tydixon Ratbat Cave, will be done this Saturday with Gordon et al. We'll post a report soon after.
(Jun 17/11)
Three more videos have been posted by Jan, Jackson's Bay Cave - Part 1 (79 MB WMV), Jackson's Bay Cave - Part 2 (69 MB WMV), and Iris Holmes processing frogs at Jackson's Bay Cave (40 MB WMV).
Elizabeth Slack will be with us for a week of intensive fieldwork starting on June 27. Targets include New Green Cave for mapping, Portland Ridge for site-finding and assessment, and the Mulgrave Sinkholes for assessment.
(May 30/11)
Two caves were visited over the last few days in assistance to Iris Holmes and her studies of frog pathogens, which might help to solve the riddle of the decline in frog populations around the world. On Friday, Jackson's Bay Cave gave us two specimens of the very rare cave species, Eleutherodactylus cavernicola, which were released, alive and healthy, at the collection locations soon after they were processed. On Sunday, four specimens of the other Jamaican cave frog, Eleutherodactylus cundalli, were taken at Belle Aire Cave 4, and processed in the same way. The procedure is to swab them to collect fungal spores, and to take a toe-clipping for DNA analysis. In effect, they receive a massage, a pedicure, and an interesting break to their usual routine - rather like a day at the spa.
(May 23/11)
The JCO will be back at Portland Ridge this Friday, at Jackson's Bay Great Cave, in assistance to Iris Holmes and her research into frogs and their fungal pathogens. If possible, we'll also try to georeference more of the many other sites in the area.
(May 18/11)
Jan has moved the videos for St Clair to the server in two parts, St Clair Cave May 8, 2011 - Part 1 (108 MB WMV) and St Clair Cave, May 8, 2011 - Part 2 (79 MB WMV).
A report for the May 8 visit to St Clair Cave has been posted on the server. A video will soon follow.
(May 10/11)
The visit to St Clair on May 8 was not entirely successful. The pole we constructed from two sections of bamboo, which was intended to get us above an unclimbable pitch, would not fit through the final passages in its disassembled form (too long). However, we did find a larger, higher chamber in the same series, with good airflow and openings in the top, that seems to be even closer to the surface (much washed-in detritus). This is where we eventually used the pole, and where it is still sitting, as, unfortunately, it was about one meter too short. A return with another section of bamboo is on the to-do list for the near future.
We have to thank Damion Whyte and Sloane Jackson for doing the bulk of the work carrying the bamboo into the cave. It was fresh, green, and not exactly light.
A lot of good video was recorded, which Jan is currently working on. We'll post it later in the week. Also, Stefan is working on the report, which will supply details on where we were in the cave, and what we found.
A video of the bat Macrotus waterhousii at Windsor Cave, taken recently by Jan during fieldwork with Dr Brock Fenton, is online.
The JCO will be at St Clair Cave this Sunday to push the possible third entrance. We hope for success, and to post news of such here soon after.
(May 4/11)
A video of the project at Belle Aire has been posted in two parts, Belle Aire 1 (113 MB WMV), and Belle Aire 2 (114 MB WMV). Both are large files, but the quality is good, and the content will be of interest to most of our visitors.
(Apr 28/11)
Fieldwork will resume on May 5, and continue indefinitely. First on the agenda will be to take care of unfinished business, including getting some of our new members into more caves, getting the Worthy Park crew into the rest of their caves, and finding Jan's lost Pantin, which may be at Schwallenburgh Cave.
Next will be a number of sites on the to-do list, including New Hall, New Green, Mulgrave, Huntley, and Morgans Pond (assuming we can convince the landowner that there's no treasure to be found). After that, sytematic assessments, by parish, will continue with Clarendon first, and then Portland..
Other interested parties, whose plans might coincide with ours, are invited to contact us at their earliest convenience.
The Belle Air fieldwork for the Urban Development Company (UDC) was completed last week, and the report will be submitted tomorrow. Three caves were assessed and mapped, two of which were found to be archaeological sites, specifically, Taino.
Peterkin Cave, Rota Cave, and Deeside Roaring River cave were visited for monitoring last weekend. The furthest part of Deesde, which was known to be close to the surface, was looked at closely, and we now have a better idea of where the frogs, E. cundalli, are reaching the surface for foraging.
St Clair Cave was visited for monitoring yesterday. It appears that tropical storm Nicole, late last year, has flushed out the water in the Inferno, and air quality is much improved. Also, a strong flow of air up into a narrow, complex passage was found about two-thirds of the way from the Lemon Ridge entrance to the Pollyground entrance. Washed-in sticks and snail shells were present, so there is no doubt that it reaches the surface. Even more interesting, large faeces that appear to be from a yellow boa were found, so a snake of substantial proportions seems to be coming in to feed on bats. A return visit to push further toward the surface is on the to-do list for the very near future.
(Mar 22/11)
The founder and head of the Jamaican Caves Organisation, Ronald Stefan Stewart, would like to announce his marriage to Christina Rose-Stewart on March 21, 2011, in Spanish Town, Jamaica. For those who don't know her yet, Christina is bright, brave, and beautiful. Stefan is very proud, and amazed, that she is now his wife.
(Mar 19/11)
A report for Stony Hill Cave, January 17, 2011 is online. The site was visited in assistance to NEPA, and is the only known roost for the bat Phyllonycteris aphylla. Positions have been removed from the online report and are by request only.
We've posted two more videos, Taino pottery at Belle Aire, March 16, 2011 (9 MB WMV), and Worthy Park Cave 2, March 6, 2011 (76 MB WMV).
Wallingford River Cave and Oxford Cave were visited for monitoring on March 15. The team consisted of RS Stewart, C Rose, Ross Little and Andrew Little. The batroost at Oxford is somewhat larger than noted during the last visit, two years ago, and now extends back into the main passage from the side-chamber to which it was restricted for some time in the past. Wallingford continues to have natural protection because of the river that flows through it - most people decline the wading and swimming necessary to travel any distance into it.
Recon at four caves on the Belle Aire property, next to Green Grotto, was done on March 16 in assistance to UDC. One was found to be a Taino site, evidenced by potsherds. The others also have archaeo potential, and a return is slated for the near future to carry out a thorough investigation.
(Mar 13/11)
Fieldwork has been temporarily suspended due to the Principal Investigator, Stewart, detaching his right collar bone while playing football. Activity should resume on Tuesday, March 15, when the pain is expected to have dropped to an acceptable level.
Worthy Park Cave 2 was visited on Sunday, March 6. The team consisted of Stewart, Pauel, Rose, McConnell, G Clarke, and C Clarke. This was the first time on-rope for the latter three, and all managed it well. The next sites on the Lluidas Vale agenda are WP-1, and WP-3.
A good quality video has been posted of the visit to Swansea Cave, January 30, 2011 (86 MB WMV). The videographer was Jan Pauel.
(Feb 26/11)
The JCO is currently in the field with Burton Lim and Alina Arcila from the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto. Videos for the first two days are now online: St Clair Cave - Pollyground Entrance - February 21, 2011, Low Resolution (14 MB WMV), Medium Resolution (75 MB WMV), and St Clair Cave - Lemon Ridge Entrance - February 22, 2011, Low Resolution (18 MB WMV), Medium Resolution (90 MB WMV).
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Stewart visited Tydixon Ratbat Cave, Lluidas Vale, on January 29 for monitoring. Unfortunately, he forgot to bring the camera, so no photos/videos were taken. A return is scheduled some time in the next few weeks, so he'll do it then.
Haiduk, Pauel, and Stewart, from the JCO, were joined by Chris Clarke, Gordon Clarke, Fraser McConnell, Peter McConnell, Toby McConnell, Gregory Worton, and Peter Worton for a visit to Swansea Cave on January 30. The group included three of the directors of Worthy Park Estate, all of whom very much understand the value of the caves on their land, and care for their future.This makes Swansea one of the best protected caves on the island.
Stewart, Ekparian, and Stern visited Thatchfield Great Cave on Feb 2. A video can be found here (59 MB WMV).
(Jan 28/11)
T he roost where NEPA recently found Phyllonycteris aphylla was visited on January 17, at their request. A video has been posted, Stony Hill Cave (86 MB WMV).
We've also posted a video, St Clair Surface Traverse (50 MB WMV) that shows the extent of deforestation in the area of St Clair Cave.
(Jan 16/11)
A video of the visit to Marta Tick Cave has been posted (130 MB WMV).
We've also posted a video of Rio Tinto discharging caustic soda effluent into the upper Rio Cobre (13 MB WMV) from the Ewarton works yesterday, Jan 15/11.
Stewart and Haiduk visited Schwallenburgh Cave again yesterday to carry out a mapping survey. We have photos and videos that will be posted along with the map in the next few days.
What may have been the final Ministry of Tourism meeting regarding the cave use guidelines took place last Thursday. We are pleased that the JCO guidelines have been used as the core of the document, and would like to thank everyone concerned for their hard work and dedication.
Fieldwork has begun for the session after ten days of settling in and getting things set up. The current base is Pollyground, near Ewarton.
Stewart has picked up a 4G USB modem, working with the Digicel network, so email is now being checked most days, and updates to the website are possible when in the field.With regard to the Digicel service, we cannot recommend it to others at the moment, because, incredibly, they do not have on outgoing server for email, and they're blocking port 2525, which we use to connect to the JCO server. This means that Thunderbird, Outlook, etc, cannot be used. We're getting around it by using our website email interface, which is a bit of a pain.
Avisfield Cave, in northern St Ann, was visited and assessed on January 7 by RS Stewart, Christina Rose, and Donovan Selvyn. The site has been degraded by a heavy input of silt, and is now only about 30cm high in places. Biota is limited to the endemic cave crab, S. veleryi.
Stewart, Pauel, Rose, and Selvyn assisted Iris Holmes in her studies of frog fungal pathogens at Marta Tick Cave on January 9 and 10. Traffic to the cave appears to have been limited since our last visit, in 2009, which is good to see - the site is the most important in the Cockpit Country.
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NEWS ARCHIVES VOL 9(Jan 2, 2010 to Dec 21, 2010)
NEWS ARCHIVES VOL 8
(Jan 8, 2009 to Dec 21, 2009)
NEWS ARCHIVES VOL 7
(Jan 6, 2008 to Dec 23, 2008)
NEWS ARCHIVES VOL 6
(Dec 12, 2006 to Dec 3, 2007)
NEWS ARCHIVES VOL 5
(Apr 24, 2006 to Dec 8, 2006)
NEWS ARCHIVES VOL 4
(Jan 22, 2005 to Mar 19, 2006)
NEWS ARCHIVES VOL 3
(Mar 9, 2004 to Dec 31, 2004)
NEWS ARCHIVES VOL 2
(Aug 15, 2003 to Mar 2, 2004)
NEWS ARCHIVES VOL 1
(Sept 30, 2002 to Aug 15, 2003)
The Jamaican Caving News © is a publication of the Jamaican Caves Organization.
Editor: RS Stewart.
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