National Speleological Society Cave Diving Section

The story of how Cow Springs slowly gave up her secrets remains close to my heart and memory. My love for springs was obvious when I was ten, and by age 15, I was frequenting them in my 1969 Plymouth Valiant. By age 16, I was diving at Peacock, Telford, Running Spring, Suwannee Blue, Sandbag (Bathtub), Devil’s Eye and Ginnie Springs. Running Spring became exploration base camp for me and fellow cave lovers Bob and David Dillenger from Jacksonville, Florida.

Cow Springs, in close proximity, ranked among our favorite waters in which to delve for secrets. I’ve always felt a close relationship with this special place. My curiosity about this seemingly ever-clear sink led to my pondering the hydrogeology of Florida’s many sinkholes. Cow obviously was a downstream cavern of a spectacular, albeit small and restrictive cave. But where was the spring side? It had to be there, but the cave foiled our early exploration attempts. I’ll never forget my frustration that its source eluded me when I felt that it should have been obvious.

The turning point came many years later in 1985 when Terri and I were living in an old farmhouse in Branford, Florida. Don Landis, an old friend, fellow videographer, and former cave student showed up at the farmhouse with exciting news. One of his cavern students, poking around at Cow, had pulled a large log from the floor of the small upstream cavern. A torrent of sand began blowing forcibly out a small fissure. Don was aware of my keen interest in this mystery. Also, our group was just starting to push gnarly, small virgin caves with our newly configured sidemount rigs. These were defining moments in the evolution of sidemounting. Don knew I’d want to hear immediately about the discovery. I was so excited about the possibilities that I never asked Don why his student was pulling giant logs out of the floor of the cavern!

Never one to let potentially significant discoveries sit, I called Woody Jasper and Lamar Hires to check it out. Our first attempt was memorable. The nearly-impassible upstream entrance featured a series of twisting strictures through breakdown. Silt and sand rained on our heads from above. We slowly worked our way downward to a true bedding plane floor. A path onward looked promising but would obviously require some real pushing. I had the reel and chose what I thought was the best option.

As I settled in to make an attempt, I felt Woody cross over my legs. He’d selected an alternate attack angle on my right side. After a few futile attempts, I decided to remove a tank and try again. By then, Woody had dropped through the fissure and was sneaking cautiously ahead of me and the reel. With Lamar nowhere in site, I kicked into high gear, determined to make this route work as well. Breaking free of the projection that had held me back, I leapt ahead to join Woody.

One of the best finds ever. Just around a left-hand bend awaited one of the greatest revelations I have ever experienced during exploration. We gazed upon a cave diver’s metaphorical treasure —a large, phreatic borehole gushing blue clear water with near-incomprehensible force. We made slow progress, but it wasn’t long before we had spooled out our first full reel of line. Woody and I surveyed out. Our exit seemed to go more smoothly after negotiating upstream through the series of dicey restrictions. We rejoined Lamar on the surface and discovered that he would need to modify his current sidemount rig before our next dive.

We returned as soon as we could. Racing out to the end of our first 400 feet of line, we quickly tied off and renewed exploration. Once again, we were awestruck by our newly discovered spring’s size and flow. Just a few feet further, we were surprised to find the cave stair stepping ever deeper. This geology was a far cry from anything we’d seen in the downstream section. Now we were at 80’, and the flow was even more forceful. As we neared the end of our second spool, we passed one of the most beautiful stratified clay banks ever discovered. The floors and walls were equally spectacular. With a pounding CO2 headache, I called the dive and surveyed out. On the surface, we excitedly agreed that we had a major discovery on our hands.

Alternative approaches and first photos. Our next dive called for more air than our 71.2 ft3 tanks could deliver. With enthusiasm running high, we agreed to do an after-work dive in a few days. We arrived at the spring to find Woody prepared with double 104s and a big spool of ski rope. Woody offered two new approaches. The first was to push his tanks ahead and then put them back on. He also wanted to lay the ski rope so fragile walls. On this dive, I would take my first images of the cave.

The combined tasks of diving sidemount 104s, carrying a camera, and making forward progress seemed almost impossible. After completing all of our tasks, we made it to the end of the line with just enough time to explore a bit further. Here we discovered Not My Fault, the doorway to the lower level. It was a magical experience. The lower level was even more challenging due to its initially lower ceiling and amazing clay floor. Yet again, Cow Springs offered us a glimpse of another of her various faces of controlling geology.

During these golden days of exploration, we spread our attentions over many different caves and endured constantly changing conditions. Exploration continued over several years, culminating with the publishing of the Cow Springs map in 1986. The usual suspects all contributed to Cow Springs’ exploration. Tom Morris, Mark Long, Dan Lins, and Jim Taylor made important contributions to the original exploration done by Woody, Lamar, and myself. But it wasn’t until nearly ten years later that several important discoveries changed how the cave could be dived.

An easier upstream entrance was first discovered and explored by Tom Morris. Knowing that hordes of divers wearing doubles would damage the fragile formations, Tom chose to keep his secret, sharing it only with a few of the Moles. Twelve years after our first dives, Mark Long would push the warm water source out over 3,000 feet. Ironically, two open-water divers accidentally came upon Tom’s entrance. They shared their discovery with Lamar Hires and other cave divers. Soon enough, the secret bypass became common knowledge. When I look now at the cave’s many scars, it saddens me that Upstream Cow gave up this one last secret.

The fact that the clay bank in Cow was vandalized by trained cave divers is inconceivable to me. We all owe a deep gratitude and thanks to Michael Angelo Gagliardi and the entire team that performed the incredible first-ever restoration of a major underwater cave feature. It certainly eased the feeling that the wound inflected would never heal, but I can’t help ask the question; How could this happen and more importantly what are we going to do about?

It’s easy to point fingers at instructors, and their students, but the problem is bigger than that. Regardless, we have reached the point where dramatic steps need to be taken. Let’s begin by screening potential students to determine their motivation for wanting to cave dive. I also feel we should turn the magnifying glass on ourselves. Workshops, and other functions must make conservation and environmental science education a priority. Without major positive change in the way we interact with the cave environment we stand to loose our already fragile rights as cave divers. — Text by Wes Skiles, photos by Wes and Jim Kozmik