What is a cave conservancy?
Caves are considered fragile habitats that provide homes to thousands of non-human species. For instance, bats alone represent over 1100 species, one quarter of the number of species for all mammals (from http://www.batcon.org/index.php/education). The purpose of the cave conservancies is to protect these unique environments from future land development, permanent closure, or abuse. For example, the SCCi lists its purpose as “to acquire and manage caves for scientific study, education of those persons interested in speleology, and conservation of these resources.
