Speleology

Caves provided protection from weather, predators, and other threats, making them ideal natural shelters for early settlers. The constant temperature inside caves also helped regulate body temperature and provided a secure place to sleep. Additionally, caves were readily available and required minimal effort to modify for habitation.

The Shenandoah Caverns are located in Quicksburg, Virginia, in the Shenandoah Valley region of the state.

The Shenandoah Caverns cave system is approximately 60 feet deep. The main cavern is about 17 feet tall and has various passages and chambers at different depths within the cave network.

The name "Cango Caves" is believed to have originated from the Khoikhoi word "xamga," meaning water. This is likely in reference to the underground water sources found within the caves.

they might find gold,rocks,minerals,silver,bronze, and precious stones

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They might but it's extremely unlikely unless the cave has cut across igneous intrusions or metamorphic-aureole rocks (I don't know that area's geology).

Limestone caves rarely show anything like that as it's not in their geology. You certainly won't find bronze in Nature, only in archaeological artefacts, as it's an artifical alloy and its two constituents (copper and tin) are found only as ore minerals.

It's not a term I have encountered in caving literature but you could define it as a particular series of passagesor inlet caves enteringin an extensive system. Generally the "sub-system" is simply calledsomething-or-otherseries.

E.g. Shatter Series is adistinct stretch of passages in Swildons Hole (SW England), reached from the main route by descending a pitch (vertical drop to a lower level) so by your definition could be called a "subsystem" of the entire cave. It isn't though - it's a "series.".

["Pitch" in UK cavingis "drop" in US.]

For the specific geology and development of any individual karst cave, such as Wynadotte Caves,you will have to read the appropriate research papers on that region and its karst features - and such papers require a suitably academic background - but the essentials are:

How Caves Form in Limestone

This is such a common question on ‘Answers’ I wrote this single reply! The technical terms are introduced by capital initials.

Most of the world’s caves are Karst features, i.e. primarily in Limestone.

Karst caves need three materials: a soluble rock like Limestone or Gypsum, water and Carbon-dioxide (CO2).

Their host limestone also needs to be of appropriate physical structure and raised into hills, then subjected to reasonably consistent precipitation for many tens or hundreds of thousands of years.

Limestone is a sedimentary rock of which the world’s greater proportion was laid down in warm, relatively shallow, seas. The rock was laid in horizontal layers – Beds – separated by Bedding-planes which generally reflect geologically-brief changes in the environment. The suite of beds is known as a Formation, generally named after its “type area”.

Later continental uplift (tectonic processes) raise the formation along with its underlying rocks, usually tilting and folding it to at least some extent in the process. Since most rocks are brittle they cannot take much stress, and limestone beds crack into grids of fine fractures called Joints. The uplift and folding often also causes Faulting – major breaks with the rock mass one side of the Fault Plane being raised, lowered or moved horizontally past that on the opposite side. (Note: Plane – the “Fault Line” sometimes misused as a political metaphor is that of the fault-plane cutting the land surface.)

Now we have the hills, next we need rain-water that has absorbed atmospheric CO2 to create Carbonic Acid (weak, natural soda water in fact!). It may be augmented by acids from the soil, too. This solvent permeates through all those joints, bedding-planes and faults; flowing very, very slowly under considerable pressure applied by its depth, from its sinks on the surface to its springs at the base of the formation. In doing so, it dissolves the limestone (chemical weathering), creating meshes of tiny micro-conduits that over many tens of thousands of years coalesce and capture each other to form cave passages.

Once this happens, the rate of erosion can increase – though still to perhaps only a few millimetres per thousand years under generally temperate climates.

A cave, or a series within a cave system, that still carries its formative stream is called “Active”, and is still being developed.

Surface changes such as the valley floor being lowered by erosion, or down-cutting within the cave by its stream, changes the water’s route and the original, now dried-out, stream-way is called “Fossil” or “Abandoned”. Such passages may be filled with silt left by floods as the main flow gradually abandons them; or may become richly decorated with Speleothems – calcite deposits such as stalactites and stalagmites precipitated from ground-water still oozing through the joints in the limestone above the cave. In time such passages may start to break down as there is no stream to dissolve away slabs falling from the roof as permeating ground-water attacks the rock above.

In the end, surface lowering of the landscape as a whole, breaches and destroys the cave. Nothing is permanent in Nature!

Caves in limestone are also parts of Karst Landscape. i.e. a landscape developed by the dissolution of limestone, giving surface features like Dolines, Limestone Pavement, and in the tropics, distinctive hills such as those represented in Chinese Willow-pattern images. ‘Karst’ is from the Slavic word ‘Kras’, the name for its world type-area.

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The above is purely an introduction to a vastly more complex and subtle series of processes, of course, and you need to refer to appropriate text-books on geology and cave studies to learn them.

The scientific study of caves is Speleology – embracing geology, hydrology, biology, archaeology and other disciplines.

Simply visiting caves to enjoy them for their scenery and the physical and mental challenges they present, is called Caving, though you can’t study a cave unless you can negotiate its obstacles. The enthusiasts are simply Cavers throughout the English-speaking world – you see “spelunkers” sometimes on ‘Answers’ but it's an old slang word not found in caving literature.

A CAVER - as simple as that, throughout the English-speaking caving world.

Someone who studies caves and their contents scientifically is a Speleologist - though he or she is still a caver because you have to be able to negotiate caves in order to study them!

Yes, monks in various religious traditions have historically lived in caves as part of their spiritual practice. This practice, known as eremitism, involves seeking solitude and contemplation in remote locations such as caves, mountains, or deserts. Caves provide a quiet and secluded environment for monks to focus on their spiritual development and connection with the divine.

Both are stream-courses - though cave passages lose their streams eventually - so they display both erosion and deposits.

Many erosion forms found in caves are not seen in surface water-courses, though roughly-similar meandering canyons, waterfalls, pot-holesand knick-pointsare common to both.

Lava Tubes in basalt lava floods.

Mass-movement Fissures behind rock masses splitting away from steep hill-sides and cliffs (a landslip feature).

Talus caves which stretch the definition a bit as they are simply voids between boulders and the cliff face from which they have fallen.

Rock shelters formed by riverine or aeolian erosion: the former in river-cliffs, the latter in deserts by the wind sand-blasting softrocks.

However, byfarthe majority are in limestone uplands offering suitable geological, hydrological and long-term climatic conditions for cave develeopment.

Yes in many places but the only reason for their being no deciduous forests above the caves in many areas, is thin soil cover on high ground.

I'm guessing that means "longest". In which case it is the Flint Ridge / Mammoth cave system (USA), with a combined total of well over 350 miles of surveyed passages.

A person who enjoys studying caves is known as a speleologist or a cave scientist. They are interested in exploring caves, studying their formations, geology, and ecosystems, as well as discovering new insights about the underground world.

Mines and caves are different things.

Mines are often in or below weak strata and have been excavated relatively quickly, intensifying the stress on the overlying rocks.

Caves, which are natural by definition, tend to be in more competent formations, but they can collapse due to erosion. Movements on faults crossing a cave can also produce collapses in the breccia around the fault.

Much of a cave formed on a fault is filled with angular boulders as the surrounding limestone was heavily fractured by the folding and faulting. As the cave developed in the usual way - dissolution of the limestone by water - these blocks simply lost lateral support and fell from the cracked walls.

The first people to live in caves were early human ancestors known as Homo erectus. They inhabited caves and rock shelters as a means of shelter and protection from the elements and predators. This practice dates back to around 1.5 million years ago.

You specify any particular examples but the main reasons are conservation (as with the original Lascaux Caves), safety (or rather fears of liability!) and in the case of show-caves, commercial failure.

Also of course, closure to the "public" does not necessarily preculde access for genuine cavers & cave-researchers.

The Carlsbad Caverns were discovered by a 16-year-old named Jim White in 1898 when he saw a black cloud of bats rising from the area. He explored the caves and later helped bring attention to their beauty and size.

Most caves are in limestone, and their passagesare active or former stream-courses, the cavities themsleves having formed primarily by weakly-acidic rain water dissolving the limestone.

It takes tens or hundreds of thousands of years to do so. I think a rate of lowering or rock surface for a cave stream in Carboniferous Limestone in temperate climates can be around 2 or 3mm/100yrs.

There are other cave types such asLava Tubes, from molten rockrunning out from under a solidified crust, and Mass-Movement Fissures, which are a land-slip feature.

The original Grotte de Lascaux (only one cave) was closed because the paintings were deteriorating thanks to the altered environment and import of fungal spores resulting from its being opened as a show-cave.

Tourists are now shown a faithful replica. The original is opened only for serious scientific research.

Luray Caverns is a cave system in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley, known for its stunning rock formations like stalactites and stalagmites. The caverns feature the "Great Stalacpipe Organ," which uses rubber mallets to tap stalactites and create music. Luray Caverns is one of the most visited caves in the United States and offers guided tours year-round.

Fantastic Caverns, like all caves in the Bible Belt are 6500 years old as opposed to other much older caves located in places where education is not considered a sin.

There may be some abrasion by sediment carried in a cave stream but the primary development of caves in limestone is due to that rock being soluble in the weak carbonic acid resulting from CO2 from the air being absorbed by rain-water.

Clay has a higher percentage of acidic cations, such as aluminum and iron, which require more lime to neutralize compared to sand. Additionally, clay has a higher cation exchange capacity (CEC), meaning it can hold onto more nutrients and cations, requiring more lime to displace the acidic elements.