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BY FREDERICK KARST
Times Correspondent | Friday, August 22, 2003 | (No comments posted.)
Outdoors it was close to 90 degrees and scorching under a hot sun, but here it was cool, wet and dark. Forty feet down in a cavern, it stays in the 50s throughout the year.
Bear Cave, four miles north of Buchanan, Mich., is almost as unlikely a sight near the southern end of Lake Michigan as a wild bear would be.
The fruit-belt countryside of Berrien County lacks the abundant limestone of the cave-rich areas of southern Indiana and Kentucky. But the kind of material in which Bear Cave was formed is nearly as remarkable as the fact that there is a cave. Bear Cave is a natural cave in tufa rock, a secondary limestone deposit on the west bank of the St. Joseph River off Red Bud Trail.
Like other limestone, tufa is made mainly of calcium carbonate that has crystallized out of solution. It was formed by evaporation, resulting in deposits over soil or organic materials. The 18-foot-thick tufa in which Bear Cave is located is thought to have been formed when water dissolved some of the limestone in primary beds and redeposited it as the underpinnings of a river terrace, giving it the name of tufa.
Another rare tufa deposit lies about 2-3/4 miles south of Bear Cave. There it forms terraces at Moccasin Bluff, also along the St. Joseph River.
Tufa has been used for construction in Italy since the days of ancient Rome and is the principal material in the Coliseum. More recently, it was imported to the United States, where it used to be popular for decorating bank lobbies.
Visitors to Bear Cave descend a staircase from the camp store of Bear Cave Resort. The Potawatomis, who are said to have named the cave, may have obtained dyes from the seepage of slurries from the rocks. Oxides of copper yield shades of green, while iron oxides produce hues that range from light tans through deeper browns to red and black.
Other cave lore relates to the Underground Railroad in the years before the Civil War. A chamber inside the cavern is known as the Slave Room -- the place where runaways are thought to have hidden during their flight to freedom. It can be reached only by wading through water.
The cave extends some 150 feet. It ranges from 4 to 6 feet wide and up to 15 feet high. Some branches are impossible to enter, and there is evidence of hidden passages.
University of Notre Dame geologists Erhard M. Winkler and Alphonse C. Van Besien speculated that the cave was formed after logs or driftwood created a framework for a narrow channel. They believed the activity coincided with the deposit of lime in the Lake Nipissing stage of the ancient Lake Michigan about 4,000 years ago. Winkler and Van Besien noted the presence of ostracod fossils in the sandy clay at the base of the tufa deposit which, together with an absence of peat, they regarded as evidence of a large permanent lake at the site.
Cavities may have opened with the decay of the organic deposits, leaving molds of tree trunks, branches and the imprints of alder leaves, along with other fossils. Humans also cleared away clay and debris. Cave dripstone formations include stalactites and stalagmites.
A boulder imbedded in the wall of the cavern was attributed to the Kansan Stage of glaciation by a professor of mineralogy from Brown University. He believed the tufa bed rested upon the most recent glacial drift dating back roughly to the last Ice Age, about 50,000 years ago.
The supposed Kansan boulder is associated in the cave with later material from the Wisconsin Stage. One cave formation appears to be the jawbone of an unidentified animal.
Bats are the most common living creatures still found in the cave and are particularly abundant in the Slave Room.
Bear Cave Resort is a membership campground, and many of the campers belong to the Coast-to-Coast Camping organization, which offers camping at $6 a night at some 600 parks, according to manager Floyd Johnson, whose wife, Marlane, usually conducts the cave tours.
The cave tour takes about 20 minutes. Visitors usually spend 30 minutes to an hour seeing the cave, a waterfall and an ancient tulip tree known as the Potawatomi Council Tree.
Porous tufa rock is exposed on the face of the bluff outside, where mosses, club mosses and flowering plants have gained a foothold in crannies that afford protection from harsh winters.
Along with the Slave Room and the Fossil Jaw, Bear Cave, like other caverns, has numerous sites with names based upon their supposed resemblance to animals or mythological beings. Appropriately, one of Bear Cave's rock formations is thought to resemble a bear.
WHAT TO BRING:
You may want a jacket or sweater, as the temperature inside the cave is about 58 degrees F, even in summer. You also might bring a camera and picnic supplies. Picnic tables are available.
IF YOU GO:
Bear Cave is located inside Bear Cave Resort, a membership campground and one of eight parks owned by the BullEk Corp., based in Florida.
The grounds cover 23-1/2 acres with 153 campsites and 10 chalets available for rental. Tent sites rent for $20 per night; other sites cost more. Reservations are required. Facilities available to campers include a pavilion, a swimming pool and hot tub. The camping season runs
from May 1 to Nov. 1, but the cave closes about Sept. 15, when a large numbers of bats begin to enter for the winter.
Hours:
Cave tours are offered from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Sunday. (Berrien County observes Eastern Daylight Time in summer.)
The cost of the tour is $3 for ages 12 and older, $1.50 for ages 6 to 11 and free for 5 and younger.
HOW TO GET THERE: Drive east on I-94 to the U.S. 12 exit. Then go east on U.S. 12 for about 22 miles to Redbud Trail. Follow Redbud Trail north about 6 miles and turn right at the sign for Bear Cave Resort. The entrance is at the camp store downhill from a parking lot. Bear Cave Resort is at 4085 Bear Cave Road, Buchanan, MI 49107.
FOR MORE INFORMATION:
Information can be obtained by calling (269) 695-3050 or on the Internet at www.bullek.com and clicking on Bear Cave.
WHAT'S THERE: Bear Cave is said to be the only natural cavern in Michigan and the only one in the Great Lakes area. It has aroused the interest of geologists and other scientists.
YOU'LL LIKE: You will enjoy exploring the wooded grounds overlooking the St. Joseph River. After you leave Bear Cave Resort, be sure to pause in the historic, tidy community of Buchanan and buy some fruit to take home at one of the nearby fruit stands.
THE KIDS WILL LIKE: Youngsters are eager to wade though water about two feet deep to visit the "Slave Room," which is believed to have concealed persons fleeing slavery on the Underground Railroad.
AND DON'T MISS: Be sure to visit the natural waterfall and walk over to the Conference Tree across the lagoon. It is said to have been used by American Indians for meetings and as a lookout above the St. Joseph River.
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