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Cave Terminology
Glossary of definitions - Speleogenesis, Geology, Speleothem, Hydrology.
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Limestone | A sedimentary rock consisting mainly of calcium carbonate CaC03. Sometimes called a "soft rock", or "organic rock"Ocean-dwelling organisms such as oysters, clams, mussels and coral use calcium carbonate (CaCO3) to create their shells and bones. |
| Joint | A planar or gently curving crack separating two parts of once continuous rock without relative movement along its plane. |
| Karst | Terrain with special landforms and drainage characteristics on account of greater solubility of certain rocks in natural waters than is common. Derived from the geographical name of part of Slovenia. |
| Phreatic Zone | AKA zone of saturation, is the part of an aquifer, below the water table, in which relatively all pores and fractures are saturated with water. Above the water table is the vadose zone. |
| Speleothem | A secondary mineral deposit formed in caves, most commonly calcite. |
| Speleology | The exploration, description and scientific study of caves and related phenomena. |
| Speleogen | A cave feature formed erosionally or by weathering in cave enlargement. |
| Boxwork (aka Spongework) | A complex of irregular, interconnecting cavities intricately perforating the rock. The cavities may range from a few entimetres to more than a metre across. |
| Supersaturated | Referring to water that has more limestone or other karst rock in solution than the maximum corresponding to normal conditions. |
| Vadose Zone | The zone where voids in the rock are partly filled with air and through which water descends under gravity. Movement of water through unsaturated media. Extends from terrestrial surface to water table. |
| Resurgence | A spring where a stream, which has a course on the surface higher up, reappears at the surface. |
| Relict Karst | Old cave forms produced by earlier geomorphic processes within the present cycle of karstification and open to modification by present-day processes such as deposition of speleothems, sediments or skeletal deposits. |
| Pseudokarst | Terrain with landforms which resemble those of karst but which are not the product of karst processes. |
| Aggressiveness | The ability of the water to dissolve rock. In karstification and speleogenesis this refers to the dissolution of limestone by the action of dissolved carbon dioxide (carbonic acid). |
| Speleogenesis | The totality of all processes which effect the creation and development of natural underground cavities. These comprise corrosion, erosion, and incasion, but are also influenced by lithology, tectonics, and climate. |
| Ontogeny | In mineralogy, the study of individual crystals, how they combine as aggregates, and their development as physical bodies. |
| Phylogeny | The study of mineral species and their paragenesis (i.e. their association with contemporaneous mineral species. |
| Genetic Mineralogy | Origin and evolution of mineral bodies including nucleation, initiation, development, alteration and disintegration. These studies were subordered into ontogeny and phylogeny which are usually medical terms but had been adapted to mineralogy. |
| Calcium Carbonate | Chemical compound CaCO3. Found in calcite, aragonite, and in the unstable polymorph vaterite which will revert back to calcite and aragonite over time. |
| Geomorphology | As applied to caves, the study of the physical features due to four main processes - weathering, mass wasting, erosion and deposition. |
| Morphology | As applied to formations, cataloging by appearance. There is some disagreement about this. For example, a Splattermite, Raft Cone or Broomstick are all Stalagmites. They all form in the same way, but they have been named diferently. |
| Helectitie Behavior | When a Helctite meets an obstacle, it may a) reflect, b) round, c) slide without separation, or d) slide with separation. |
| Equalibrium | Equilibrium is properly one of the basic tenets of geology, along with uniformitarianism. Steady-state and is fundamental every branch of geological work: tectonics, sedimentology, geomorphology, geophysics, paleontology, hydrology, geochemistry. |
| Disequilibrium | landforms are those that tend toward equilibrium but have not had sufficient time to reach such a condition |
| Hydrokinetic | Part of the process of hypogenesis, where water movement creates energy that aids the hollowing out underneath the water. |
| Lithology | Lithology focuses on grains, while rock type focuses on pores. A description of visible physical characteristics. The science that studies rocks, including the origin, age, composition, structure and distribution throughout the planet. |
| Geology | Generally, geology describes the occurrence and changing of rock on Earth's crust over a long time period. |
| Petrology | Petrology is the study of rocks - igneous, metamorphic, and sedimentary - processes that form and transform them. composition, texture, and structure; occurrence & distribution; & origin in relation to physicochemical conditions and geologic processes |
| Overprinting | a geological process that leaves marks altering the marks of an earlier process. Examples include various phases of deformation of rocks in such a way that the initial structures are modified, sometimes even beyond recognition |
| Passage network density | Ratio of the cave length to the area of the cave field, km/km2 |
| Cave porosity | A fraction of the volume of a cave block, occupied by mapped cavities. |
| Hydrostratigraphy | Structure of subsurface porous materials in reference to the flow of groundwater , related to stratigraphy - geology that deals with the origin, composition, distribution, and succession of strata, a layer or a series of layers of rock in the ground. |
| Aquitard | Poorly permeable underground layer (that limits the flow of groundwater from one aquifer to another. |
| Aquifuge | An aquifuge is an absolutely impermeable unit that will not transmit any water. |
| Aquifer | Water-bearing zones or subsrface layers with higher hydraulic conductivity. Can be confined or unconfied (flowing). Porous rock or sediment saturated with groundwater. enters as precip seeps through the soil and resurfaces through springs and wells. |
| Confining Layer | Aquifer layer which is confined, no exit is available for water to escape such as in an unconfined layer. |
| Clastic Sedimentary Rock | Clastic rocks made of pieces (clasts) of pre-existing rocks loosened by weathering, then transported to a basin or depression where sediment is trapped. If the sediment is buried deeply, it becomes compacted and cemented, forming sedimentary rock. |
| Paleokarst | Karstified rock /area buried by later sediments; in some places, caves have been filled by later sediments. A decoupled contemporary system that experienced tectonic subsidence & lie under clastic cover, at times exhumed & re-integrated to active systems |
| Evapotranspiration | Evapotranspiration is the sum of water evaporation and transpiration from a surface area to the atmosphere. Evaporation accounts for the movement of water to the air from sources such as the soil, canopy interception, and water bodies. |
| Fluvial Sediments | Sediment deposited by running water, draining off insoluble rocks carry sediment with them underground. Where it is deposited and sometimes cemented. Factors include water velocity, grain size, and cave geometry. |
| Pluvial | A rainy period formerly regarded as coeval with a glacial age, but now recognized as episodic and, in the tropics, as characteristic of interglacial ages. |
| Coeval | Equal to, same as - see usage in Pluvial definition' |
| Choke | A passage that has been blocked by fallen debris , sediment, formations etc. Occasionally the presence of airflow may indicated that the choke is an entrance point to a cave, or it is just a dead end. |
| Breathing | Movement of air in a cave. Air pressure tries to equalize with outside air pressure. winter air is colder and thus denser than cave air, moving down cave floors and pushing warmer air out of a cave. |
| Condensation-corrosion | Mosit airflow collects or condenses on walls and speleothems. The moisture can corrode the surface that faces upwind. As air pushes moisture downwind cave coral or "scrubbing" may occur. |
| Anastomoses | Braided solution tubes, frequently appearing on the undersides of poorly jointed limestone strata. These features, which form phreatically, are known to contribute to the rapid development and expansion of proto-caves. |
| Breakdown | Blocks or slabs of rock fallen from the ceiling of a cave. Very common, breakdown may be small or they may be as big as schoolbuses. In either case, they form the floor of many passageways and must be climbed over or through to continue exploration. |
| Push Trip, Pushing, Pushed | refers to pushing through tough or tight passage in an attempt to locate more cave. If someone says a lead has been "pushed," it is generally accepted (although not universally true) that there is no more accessible cave beyond. |
| TAG | Acronym for An acronym for Tennessee, Alabama and Georgia. Commonly used to refer to the cave-rich area surrounding the joining of these three states. |
| Breccia | Breccia (from Italian word for rubble) is a sedimentary rock composed of broken fragments of minerals or rocks cemented together by a fine-grained matrix that can be similar to or different from the composition of the fragments. |
| Diagenesis | Changes in the mineralogy, geochemistry, texture and fabric of a sediment after deposition |
| Gour | Synonymous with rimstone dam. Derived from the French, the term ‘gour’ is now widely used in Europe. It should not be confused with the same word used for surface erosion features in deserts. |
| Pendant | A smooth sculptured projection of bedrock suspended from the roof or wall of a cave. Formed by erosion, - not redeposited as a secondary mineral deposit. Not a speleothem. |
| Pendulite | A kind of stalactite which is or has been partly submerged in cave water for some time and now has a growth of dog-tooth crystal over that part which was submerged, to give the appearance of a drumstick. |
| Quaternary | Of or pertaining to the youngest geological period covering approximately 1.8 million years to the present |
| Radon | The heaviest known gas which is colourless, odourless and radioactive, Small quantities of radon, formed by decay of uranium minerals, are found in rock and soil. Concentration , can collect in some caves and is believed to be a potential health hazard. |
| Supersaturated | Referring to water that has more calcium carbonate or other karst rock mineral in solution than the maximum corresponding to normal conditions. |
| Primary Mineral | A natural occurring homogeneous solid, of definite chemical composition and crystal structure. (eg. calcium carbonate., ). Rocks may be comprised of several minerals (eg. granite or basalt), others composed of a single mineral (eg. limestone or dolomite). |
| Secondary Mineral | A mineral originating from another mineral as a result of chemical change caused by atmospheric oxidation, carbonic acid and water. ie. Speleothems consisting of calcite, aragonite |
| Grike | a solution fissure, a vertical crack about 0.5 m wide formed by the dissolving of limestone by water, that divides an exposed limestone surface into sections or clints |
| Travertine | A form of dense, closely compacted limestone consisting mainly of banded layers. It is often coloured white or cream and consists mostly of CaCO3 which is deposited from spring, river or lake water. |
| Twilight Zone | The outer part of a cave where daylight penetrates and gradually diminishes to zero light, Between the entrance zone and dark zone |
| Aragonite | A mineral composed of calcium carbonate, CaCOa, like calcite but differing in crystal form. |
| Sulfuric Acid (relate to Hypogenic Caves) | When an underground source of hydrogen sulfide wells up and mixes with down-percolating oxygenated water from the surface the mixture of water, hydrogen sulfide and oxygen forms sulfuric acid. |
| Hydrogen Sulfide | Hydrogen sulfide is available from many natural sources. It is generated by the anaerobic decomposition of organic materials, and also produced in large quantities during volcanic actions and from geo-thermal springs and features. |
| Dissolution | The process of changing from a solid form into a fluid form |
| Consolidation | The act of becoming solid. The joining of multiple elements into one. |
| Sinkhole | A depression in the surface caused by the dissolution of the rock beneath. |
| Conulite (see Virtual Cave) | Conulites are the "splash cups" that form on certain cave floors beneath energetic ceiling drip sites. When ceiling drops crash down onto poorly consolidated cave sediment, sediment grains may disperse and if they degassand cement the dispersed grains. |
| Stalactite | Greek stalasso, "to drip", as applied to limestone caves is a speleothem that hangs from the ceiling of caves, usually cone shaped, secondary mineral solution dripping water depositing calcium carboate out of solution. |
| Stalagmite | A secondary mineral deposit, typically but not always (splattermite, witches broom) cone shaped, that grows upward from the cave floor, from Greek "stalagmias", dripping. |
| Condensation Corrosion | Water vapor from a cave atmosphere condensing to the walls of a cave creates a water film in equilibrium. with the partial pressure p of the cave atmosphere. This solution is aggressive to limestone resulting in thee disslution process. |
| Entrainment | In physical geography, entrainment is the process by which surface sediment is incorporated into a fluid flow (such as air, water or even ice) as part of the operation of erosion. |
| Imbrication | A primary depositional fabric consisting of a preferred orientation of clasts such that they overlap one another in a consistent fashion, rather like a run of toppled dominoes. Imbrication is observed in conglomerates and some volcaniclastic deposits. |
| Morphology | Related to Cave Geology, Speleology, it is observations on the way things appear. Structure, contrast, definition, texture, etc. |
| Biostratigraphy | Stratigraphy that involves the use of fossil plants and animals in the dating and correlation of the stratigraphic sequences of rock in which they are discovered. A zone is the fundamental division recognized by biostratigraphers. |
| Deep Time | Refers to the time scale of geologic events, which is vastly, almost unimaginably greater than the time scale of human lives and human plans. It is one of geology's great gifts to the world's set of important ideas. |
| Isotopic dating | Decay rates of certain unstable isotopes of elements and that these rates have been constant over deep time. Also based on when the atoms of an element decay within a mineral or a rock, they remain and don’t escape to the surrounding rock, water, or air. |
| Uranium Lead dating | Of all the isotopic dating methods in use today, the uranium-lead method is the oldest and, when done carefully, the most reliable. uranium-lead has a natural cross-check built into it that shows when nature has tampered with the evidence. |
| Recharge, groundwater recharge | The rate at which aquifers are replenished, a difficult components of the water budget to quantify. impacted by the amount and intensity of precipitation, soil and vegetation types, geology and topography. Highly variable in space and time. |
| Dips and strikes | The strike is the direction of intersection of an inclined surface with any horizontal plane The dip angle is always in a vertical plane and is measured downward from the horizontal plane. The dip direction is always perpendicular to the strike. |
| Intrusion | Intrusive rock is formed when magma penetrates existing rock, crystallizes, and solidifies underground to form intrusions, such as batholiths, dikes, sills, laccoliths, and volcanic necks |
| Magmatic Dike (aka dyke) | a sheet of rock that is formed in a fracture of a pre-existing rock body. Magmatic dikes form when magma flows into a crack then solidifies as a sheet intrusion, either cutting across layers of rock or through a contiguous mass of rock. |
| Clastic Dike | Clastic dikes are sedimentary, formed when sediment fills a pre-existing crack.[ |
| Clastic | Clastic rocks are composed of fragments, or clasts, of pre-existing minerals and rock. A clast is a fragment of geological detritus, chunks and smaller grains of rock broken off other rocks by physical weathering. |
| Fault | A planar fracture or discontinuity in rock, across which there has been significant displacement as a result of movement. Not every crack is a fault. Rock movement on either side. Sudden movement releases energy causing an earthquake. |
| Brunton Compass | Brunton is the name of a manufacturere. This compass has the most use by structural geologists, measuring foliation and lineation in metamorphic rocks, or faults and joints in mining areas. |
| Uranium-thorium dating (aka uranium-series disequilibrium dating) | radiometric dating to determine age of calcium carbonate materials such as speleothem. Calculates age from the degree to which secular equilibrium has been restored between radioactive isotope thorium-230 and radioactive parent uranium-234 in a sample. |
| Cleavage plane | Cleavage is the property of a mineral that allows it to break smoothly along specific internal planes (called cleavage planes) when the mineral is struck sharply with a hammer |
| Fracture | Fracture is the property of a mineral breaking in a more or less random pattern with no smooth planar surfaces. |
| Boxwork | Speleogen formed when bedrock between preexisting calcite veins weathered away as the cave developed. The blades of the mineral calcite that project from cave walls or ceilings that intersect one another at various angles, forming a honeycomb pattern. |
| Mafic (Gabbro in LSC) | mineral or rock is a silicate mineral or igneous rock rich in magnesium and iron. Dark in color, and common rock-forming mafic minerals include olivine, pyroxene, amphibole, and biotite. Common mafic rocks include basalt, diabase and gabbro. |
| Goethite | Mineral of the diaspore group, consisting of iron(III) oxide-hydroxide, specifically the "α" polymorph. It is found in soil and other low-temperature environments such as sediment. |
| Pseudomorphs | a mineral or mineral that appears in an atypical form (crystal system), resulting from a substitution process in which the appearance and dimensions remain constant, but the original mineral is replaced by another. The name literally means "false form" |
| Alteration | Any change in the mineralogic composition of a rock brought about by physical or chemical means, esp. by the action of hydrothermal solutions; also, a secondary, i.e., supergene, change in a rock or mineral. |
| Supergene alteration | sulfide enrichment, (aka) Secondary Enrichment, natural upgrading of buried sulfide deposits by the secondary or subsequent deposition of metals that are dissolved as sulfates in waters percolating through the oxidized mineral zone near the surface. |
| Vug | A small to medium-sized cavity inside rock. It may be formed through a variety of processes. Most commonly, cracks and fissures opened by tectonic activity (folding and faulting) are partially filled by quartz, calcite, and other secondary minerals. |
| XRD | X-Ray Diffraction, XRD is commonly used in geology and mining (earth science) laboratories to characterize the mineralogical composition |
| XRF | X-Ray Fluorescence, routinely used for the chemical composition. In a typical crystalline sample, XRF might measure for example gives information about CaO, CaCO3 , Ca(OH)2 contents and the total Ca concentration or the total Fe concentration. |
| Ramiform | A symbol or structure that is shaped like a branch, or which branches. A ramiform pit is a branched pit formed by the coalescence of the cavities of two or more simple pits |
| Estavelle | Unusual and somewhat rare karst phenomenon.An intermittent resurgence or exsurgeroe, active only in wet seasons. May act alternatively, they either discharge water as a spring or allow water to sink, depending on groundwater conditions. |
| Ponor | A natural opening where surface water enters into underground passages; they may be found in karst landscapes where the geology and the geomorphology is typically dominated by porous limestone rock. |
| Gour | See rimstone dam |
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