The Big Spring - Convergence of Many Trails EarthCache

This cache has been archived.

condor1: I have had to many newbie sanctimonious cachers logging this Earth Cache as a find and then giving me grief about having to answer the visit verification questions

I will just stop playing the game (after 10 years) because I will not put up with their crappy attitudes. The problems and harassing crap is just not worth putting up with these twits anymore.

Goodbye to Geocaching which has or used to be fun but not anymore.

More
Hidden : 10/18/2010
Difficulty:
1.5 out of 5
Terrain:
1.5 out of 5

Size: Size: other (other)

Join now to view geocache location details. It's free!

Watch

How Geocaching Works
Looking for a different adventure?

Please note Use of geocaching.com services is subject to the terms and conditions in our disclaimer.

Geocache Description:

The Big Spring of Big Spring Texas is located in Comanche Trail Park. The spring sits quietly at the south west end of Cosden Lake in Comanche Trail Park. Coordinates are for the viewing area. Its a very short and easy hike from the parking area.

STAY ON ALL MARKED PATHS

Come visit the The Big Spring in Comanche Trail Park. This beautiful park is the home of the spring that gave Big Spring it's name.

Long used by regional inhabitants, both permanent and nomadic, with a large number of locally-collected artifacts testifying to its heavy occupation, the spring sat astride the several branches of the later-developed Comanche War Trail as they converged on this important water hole from beyond Texas

Howard County and the Big Spring are located in an area where three ecological regions merge. To the north and east are the western Rolling Plains; to the south is the Edwards Plateau; and to the west are the southern High Plains (also known as the Llano Estacado or the Staked Plains).

Geology: Much of west-central Texas is a relatively flat, dry region noted for its geographic monotony. At Big Spring State Park, however, the northern limit of the Edwards Plateau is reached, culminating in a series of bluffs rising 200 feet above the rolling plains. The Edwards Plateau is a vast, relatively flat upland area stretching as far southeast as Austin and San Antonio. Thick beds of Lower Cretaceous limestone form the plateau, deposits of an ancient sea that once covered much of Texas. The eastern and southern parts of the plateau have been cut into hilly terrain known as the Hill Country.

Big Spring State Park caps one of the limestone bluffs at the northern edge of the plateau. Below the bluff, known as Scenic Mountain, sprawls the town of Big Spring, named for this large spring which served as the only watering place for herds of bison, antelope, and wild horses within a 60-mile radius, as well as natives and early settlers.

The spring was sourced from a relatively small aquifer situated on the northern end of the Edwards Plateau and the southern end of the High Plains, being, structurally, a collecting sink of lower Cretaceous (Fredericksburg) limestones and sands. The spring aquifer held a large quantity of water due to the great number of fractures, solution channels, and interstices in the rocks and underlying sands, although the aeral extent of the Big Spring sink is estimated to be only one mile in diameter, with the main area only 3000' in width and almost circular, with some ellipticity trending towards the west. The Cretaceous beds subsided about 280' below their normal position, centered around the SE quarter of Section 12, Block 33 T1S; T&P RR Co survey, and the entire strata appears to be preserved within the sink, the surface topography roughly following the subsurface subsidence.

(US Department of the Interior publication, 'Geological Survey Water-Supply Paper 913', 1944).

This writing identifies the sink as one of a number of similar subsurface geologic features in the surrounding area, differing from the Big Spring sink only in the fact that the surface topography above the others, while showing some decline, does not dip low enough to intersect the top of the water tables; hence, no springs could form from the other aquifers.

In a passing comment, enigmatic in its content and disappointing in its brevity, the report states that no other comparable deep sinks formed elsewhere on the Edwards Plateau.

PLEASE DO NOT
PUT YOUR ANSWERS
IN YOUR VISIT LOG


To Log this Earth Cache Here are Questions to Answer and E-mail to (HERE)

Any Logs that have not met the criteria as stated in this Earthcache
page will be deleted with a reason E-mailed to the Logger.

1) From this vantage point give an (area) estimate of the size of the Spring Pool in front of you.
"Answers can be given in "Feet by Feet" or even Fractions of an Acre"

2) Is this an Active Spring ? State Your Info. Source (Hint: See linked Source Document)

3) Proceed to the The Levee Coordinates and identify the color of the largest strata layer below where the Spring Water is flowing from.

4) From the Levee Coordinates is there any notable large object in the Spring Pool and identify what it is?

5) Proceed to the 3rd set of coordinates listed as "Pool Viewing Point"
How many bodies of water can be seen from this vantage point?
Hint: Look in all directions - Also, how tall the Observer is may produce a different number of bodies of water that the cacher can see.
PLEASE DO NOT POST PICTURES OF THE ITEMS ASKED IN THE QUESTIONS


 The goals of Earthcaches are as follows:
 1. EarthCache sites must provide Earth science lessons.
2. EarthCache sites must be educational
3. EarthCaches should highlight a unique feature
4. EarthCache sites follow the geocaching principles and adhere to the principles of
Leave No Trace for outdoor ethics.
5. Logging of an EarthCache must involve visitors undertaking some educational task that relates to the Earth science at the site.

 Information Sources for this Earthcache:
Bureau of Economic Geology, 1981, Llano sheet, Geologic Atlas of Texas, Bureau of Economic Geology, University of Texas at Austin

Bureau of Economic Geology, 1974, San Angelo Sheet, Geologic Atlas of Texas, Bureau of Economic Geology, University of Texas at Austin

U.S. Department of the Interior | U.S. Geological Survey Howard County TX ( LINK)

Texas Water Development Board Report 189,
MAJOR AND HISTORICAL SPRINGS OF TEXAS March 1975 By Gunnar Brune
This is a 13.5 Meg pdf file but a very interesting read for the research on question #2 (LINK)
Congrats to dekoning for FTF

Additional Hints (No hints available.)



Advertising with Us

Inventory

There are no Trackables in this cache.

View past Trackables

What are Trackable Items?

Bookmark Lists

View all 4 bookmark lists...