(1) Jerry Isaman – A Proposed Management Plan for Chiracahua Crystal Cave
At Jerry Trout's request for input to a management plan for Chiricahua Crystal Cave, EGI formed a subcommittee to make recommendations. Based loosely on EGI experience with management of Onyx Cave, the committee wrote a complete plan as their proposal. The plan revolves around cave stewards, volunteer cavers knowledgeable of the cave who will accompany all trips into the cave, and specifies responsibilities and requirements for becoming so designated. Supporting definitions include key holders, trip leaders, reservations, and key deposits. Additional specifications include group composition and sizes, cave etiquette, equipment, safety, and adherence to cave protection laws made clear to cavers. Ranger and key holder responsibilities and a database to track those caving in Crystal as well as those qualified as trip leaders and cave stewards are also specified.

(2) Henry Schneiker – Improving LED Efficiency
The total efficiency of an LED light is the sum of all of its parts: battery, contacts, power supply, thermal path, LED and optical path. To maximize the efficiency of the system, all these sub-systems must be optimized without adversely affecting the other systems.

(3) Scott Nicolay – Footsteps in the Dark Zone: Ritual Cave Use in Southwest Prehistory
Published studies describe numerous caves in the Southwest as shrines or ceremonial sites. Despite this recognition, as well as additional evidence for ritual cave use as early as the Late Archaic, there has been little attempt to explore what Hough (1914:91) described as a “cave cult” that “has survived to the present.” The purpose of the present study is to present an initial synthesis of the widely scattered information about ritual cave use in Southwest prehistory, to place both the archaeological record and its study in context, and suggest avenues for future research.

(4) Lang Brod – Geology of Sawmill Canyon, Santa Rita Mountains, AZ
For many years, I have been mapping and interpreting the geology of Sawmill Canyon. My report will discuss the surface geologic features and the small caves in the canyon.

(5) Steve Smith – A Possible New Species of Troglobitic Centipede
On a recent trip into Scroll Cave, I discovered what might be a new species of a blind troglobitic centipede. A photograph and a description of its size and behavior will be presented. Surface centipede species often wander into Arizona caves, sometimes to surprising distances from the entrance. Also, worldwide, purely troglobitic cave centipedes are not uncommon. However, my initial investigation has uncovered no documented reference of a species of blind purely troglobitic centipede in any Arizona cave. This example from Scroll, which lacks pigmentation and appears to be totally eyeless, may be a new species. However, a great deal of additional work will be required to confirm the taxonomic identification.

(6) Paul Jorgenson – Drought in Arizona: An Update
At a past ARA several years ago, I presented a talk on how the recent drought has affected the Arizona landscape and caves. In this talk, I will be able to provide an update on Arizona’s drought conditions since my last presentation.

(7) Steve Peerman – A History of the Big Manhole Cave Digging Effort
I will present a slide program with narrative chronicling the history of the Big Manhole Cave dig effort. The program will include pictures of the early efforts (which was coordinated by the original director of the project, Bill Yett), along with pictures and discussion explaining the current status of the dig.

(8) Jerry Trout – U.S. Forest Service Update
An overview and discussion of current issues affecting caves and cavers on U.S. Forest Service lands.

(9) Paul Jorgenson – Commercially available “HAM” Radios for Underground Communication
Some commercially available ”HAM” radios can be readily used for underground communication. The talk will focus on the radio and some antennas than have been used to talk from the surface to underground.

(10) Debbie Beucher – An Acoustic Survey for Bats Along the Colorado River Corridor
Appropriate conservation requires an understanding of how the resource is used by an animal. Because bats are nocturnal mammals, knowledge of how they use a resource has been difficult and time-consuming to obtain. Prior to the development of ultrasonic bat detectors, a resource inventory for bats was conducted using standard mist-netting techniques at water sources. However, netting is biased towards bats easily captured over pools of water or along low flyways. In addition, the vast remoteness of much of the Colorado River Plateau, combined with the ability of bats to fly long distances over rugged terrain, has constrained our knowledge of when and how bats might use the resource. However, since the development of affordable field-robust bat detectors, we now have another tool by which to evaluate the landscape for use by bats. I will present a brief overview of bat echolocation plus information regarding two field-popular bat detectors: Anabat II (frequency division) and Pettersson D240x (time-expansion). Both detectors are designed to record the ultrasonic calls of bats for later identification in the laboratory. But because each system has known advantages and disadvantages, by combining the two methods we benefit from the advantages and reduce the disadvantages. I will discuss the techniques I used to monitor bat use of the Colorado River corridor using both detectors, providing specific examples of acoustic sampling of ultrasonic bat call conducted during a research river trip in September 2004.

(11) Tom Gilliland – An Overview of the Arizona Cave Survey
Historically, most of the caves of Arizona have been successfully managed with a hands-off approach of secrecy and limited access. With the advent of GPS technology, increasing human populations, easy to use computer databases, and Internet information distribution, this secrecy based resource management philosophy has become ineffective. As cave location information becomes more widespread, there will be increasing pressures on this unique and limited resource. New and proactive management plans will be needed to manage the caves and their important biological, archaeological, paleontological, historical and geological resources. The first step to manage a resource is to determine what the resource consists of. The primary goal of the Arizona Cave Survey (ACS) is to gather all information about caves in the state of Arizona. A great deal of information already exists, but due to the historical secrecy ethic, much of the data is not available to qualified researchers and land managers. Through extensive literature searches, caver and land manager communications, and on-site fieldwork, the ACS has compiled a great deal of cave data. Due to the sensitive nature of this information, the ACS will only release information to qualified researchers and the actual land managers of specific caves. The compiled cave data consists of a master database of nearly 1,000 Arizona Caves, a computer based GIS location plot, a collection of cave maps, digital and hard-copy files on each cave, and a library of Arizona cave literature. The Arizona Cave Survey is an on-going project, and as the cave data grows so will the capability to care for this unique resource.

(12) Discussion & Finalization of Plans: A Proposal for a Joint ARA/SWR Spring 2006 Regional Meeting
During the latter part of 2005, a proposal was kicked around about the possibility of the ARA and SWR jointly holding their Spring 2006 meeting at a site in SE Arizona or SW New Mexico. The Mesilla Valley Grotto (Las Cruces) has volunteered to host the spring meeting, tentatively at a site in the Black Range (NM). Possible time frame is late-March to early-April. ARA and SWR representatives plan to meet during lunch to discuss plans for this joint meeting, and hope to brief the attendees on the finalized date and location.

If Time Permits: Presentations by Bob Beucher and Tom Strong