Category Archives: Biology

Biology trip reports and stats

15 October 2022 Upstream Thunder River

Trip report by Tony Schmitt

Entry Time: 10am
Exit Time: 4pm

As part of the MCKC 30th anniversary and celebration of the Carroll Cave acquisition, I agreed to lead a trip. Martin Carmichael (Chouteau Grotto) along with Jen Sutherland and Cathleen Yung (both MVG) signed up. Martin has been in the cave many times. Cathleen has been in the cave once on a survey trip downstream to survey a sleazy side passage. This was Jen’s first introduction to Carroll. Both Jen and Cathleen are newer to the caving community. Both are competent, enthusiastic and easy to get along with. Our goal for the day was the Second Azure Pool and the Chocolate Bunny. read more

19 March 2022 Bat Roost detector

Participants: Bill Gee
Seth Colston
Martin Carmichael
Kohl Mitchell
Shannon Zaloz
Emma Buckingham

Trip report by Bill Gee.

The main goal of this trip was to relocate the bat roost detector from the Mountain Room to the Lunch Room guano piles. We also planned to replace the batteries and the memory card in the roost detector, and to upgrade its firmware. The final goal was to collect three of the stream level data loggers so they can be sent in for battery replacement. read more

14 November 2021 Biology Trip

Participants – Bill Gee
John Roth
Pamela Hart

Time in = 9:45am, time out = 1:00pm

In mid-October we received a trip permit request from Dr. Pamela Hart. No one had any idea who she was, but the trip permit mentioned Matt Niemiller who we have worked with in the past. After further discussion with Dr. Hart we figured out this was a legitimate request. Jeff Page left it to me as leader of the Biology Project to make appropriate arrangements. read more

30 October 2021 Bat Census Trip

Participants – Bill Gee
Kristen Godfrey
Matthew Hernandez
John Roth
Martin Carmichael

Time in 0915, time out 1815.

This was the annual bat census trip in Carroll Cave. We run this trip near the end of October every year. This year, besides counting bats, we had an additional task to exchange batteries and memory card in the bat roost detector in the Mountain Room. We also moved the bat roost detector to a new position that gives it a better view of the passage to the natural entrance. read more

12 July 2021 Guano Pile Check

Guano pile quick check

Participants – Bill Gee
Rita Worden
Seth Colston

Time in – 8:00am, Time out 11:00am

For many years we have assumed that Carroll Cave was a summer host to a maternity colony of grey bats. The bats use several guano piles located in Carroll Passage upstream from the Lunch Room. We have done trips through there in October for about 15 years. The guano gauges always show signs of use at sometime in the previous year. We have never had any more accurate idea of when the bats are roosting over the guano piles. read more