Oregon Caves National Monument
| Oregon Caves National Monument | |||
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| Location: | Oregon , United States | ||
| Next city: | Medford | ||
| Surface: | 2 km² | ||
| Founding: | July 12, 1909 | ||
| Visitors: | 76,966 (2007) | ||
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Oregon Caves National Monument is a protected area in the southwest of the US state of Oregon , near the border with California . It is designated as a National Monument and is under the administration of the National Park Service . It is unusual that large parts of the cave were washed out of marble , so that the stalactites stand against an unusual background.
In front of the cave entrance, a rustic hotel was built in the 1930s, which is today considered to be an example of the integration of a building into the environment and nature.
location
The cave is located in Mount Elijah , in the Siskiyou Mountains , just 30 kilometers north of the California border. The National Monument extends from approx. 1250 to 1800 m above sea level and consists on the surface largely of a primeval forest of Douglas fir , Colorado fir , Lawson's cypress and incense cedar with only a few deciduous trees, including madrona from the strawberry tree . In the park is one of the thickest Douglas firs in Oregon with a diameter of about four meters.
Cave Creek rises in the cave and crosses the park area in a small canyon and flows north-west to the Illinois River and the Rogue River to the Pacific.
The cave
The cave owes its existence to the sediments of a primeval sea in the Jurassic Age about 200 million years ago. Limestone formed under pressure from further layers of sediments and volcanic rocks . Over time, the rock was lifted, unfolded and broken. The resulting pressure reshaped the structure of the limestone, and the new crystal structure resulted in marble. The forces continued to work and broke many deep crevices in the rock.
Over millions of years the rock was raised further, the surface layers above eroded and when the marble was so close to the surface that water and the acids dissolved in it could penetrate the broken layers, they washed passages and caves out of the rock over long geological periods.
Stalactites could only arise because the water level later sank so much that the cave was dry. Now groundwater only trickled through the cracks and caves and no longer only loosened the rock, but deposited tiny amounts of calcite with every drop . Over time, the calcite formed layers that slowly grew. Where the water fell as drops, stalactites and stalagmites formed, where it slowly drained off, sinter crusts grew .
Today the cave has been explored to a depth of 5.5 km, the first kilometer of which is accessible to visitors. In the cave, especially many old animal skeletons have been found, including a grizzly bear , with the radiocarbon dating , making has been dated to 50,000 years it the oldest ever found Grizzly of the United States.
history
The cave was discovered by Elijah Davidson in 1874 when he followed his dog into a crevice while hunting a bear. In 1890 the first attempt to offer commercial cave tours failed because the area was too sparsely populated and too remote for tourism. In 1907, the writer and adventurer Joaquin Miller visited the cave and reported what led US President William H. Taft to protect it in 1909 .
In 1934, the cave was placed under the newly established National Park Service and as part of the New Deal , the Civilian Conservation Corps expanded the access road and built a rustic hotel.
Today, the Oregon Caves National Monument is a small park in the US national park system in terms of area and visitor numbers, with visitors mostly from the surrounding area and neighboring states.
Web links
- National Park Service: Oregon Caves National Monument (official site; English)