The cave has been owned by Stephany Clifton for many years now. She has
been either under pressure or interested in developing those parcels of
land for residential development off and on for a long while now. TCMA
and a few private cavers have shown interest in obtaining the land, and
Ms. Clifton has shown interest in putting it in caver's hands, but the
price is too steep and she hasn't been willing to donate or lower the
price to protect the cave. We have gone through this cycle several
times and it seems that the property hasn't sold (at least based on what
I have heard).
Access has been touchy due to the people that do live very nearby the
cave and the attempts to develop the property. I haven't spoken with
her for a while now and have no idea what the situation currently is,
but it is most likely still "in attempted transition" or so. If you
really want to visit the cave, I can contact her. It was you that got
me into the cave in the first place. But I would suggest waiting until
the bats are gone :-)
Travis
On 6/15/2010 11:42 PM, David wrote:
I am posting this so that I don't step on anybody's turf.
I hope to soon post an update about the status of Brehmer
Cave.
At the moment, I only know that Melitta Stahl's granddaughter
owns the 2 caves. I was told by the former manager of the ranch
today ( who I found on Facebook ), that the cave is closed
due to all the houses nearby.
I think I know which granddaughter inherited the cave, but I sent
them both Facebook messages in hopes of a reply.
Melitta Stahl passed away in April of 2008, and I think that was
mentioned then. But her daughter became the contact person,
in the late 80's. ( I haven't found her yet )
For those of you who have not been to these 2 caves. The smaller
of the 2, is a crawl in entrance full of harvestman, over lots of debris
( dirt, rocks, sticks, guano, etc. ) Immediately you are in a small
room with enough room to take a group photo around some nice formations.
Then there is a short crawl to a smaller room that often had ringtail cats.
The larger cave has a nice entrance that you can stoop walk through to a
good size room with a man-made skylight ( or possibly an enlarged sinkhole
entrance ). This was a guano mine, and I was told it had
historical importance.
The skylight is fenced off and lots of brush going around it.
The back of the big room is, or was full of bats. Beyond the big
room, is a small
passage leading to a small room with some old grafitti.
There is a tiny lead in the cave, but you would have to be small and skinny to
push it. It is in the entrance going the opposite direction from
the rest of the
cave.
I have never seen a map of Little Brehmer Cave, but the old map of Brehmer Cave
looked accurate enough to describe the passage that I went into a few times.
I seem to recall an old-timer telling me there was passage that was not on that
map.
After doing all that and righting the above I found the following link
showing a
caving trip just 4 years ago. ( I don't remember the cave being that pretty ).
http://www.oztotl.com/Pages/2006/Brehmers.html
And it is listed as the 124th longest cave.
Hopefully, to be continued.
David Locklear
Ref: http://www.caves.org/section/asha/saltpeter-survey.pdf
http://www.utexas.edu/tmm/sponsored_sites/tss/longdeep/tsslongcaves.htm
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