The 2025 NCKMS production team recognizes the inherent value of informal interactions and spontaneous discussions that often occur outside the confines of our symposium's scheduled programming.
Networking breaks, coffee sessions, and social gatherings offer invaluable opportunities for knowledge exchange, allowing our participants to share practical insights, innovative solutions, and personal experiences. These informal settings foster a collaborative atmosphere where cave and karst management professionals may connect with their peers, forge relationships, discuss ideas, and help build a collective expertise and shared knowledgebase within our field.
During the 2025 NCKMS conference, we encourage all of our participants to actively engage in both formal and informal networking opportunities. We are working on several programs to help extend these opportunities and will announce additional details in the coming months.
Ice Cream Ice-Breaker Social
Howdy Party & Networking Social
Banquet Dinner & Keynote Speaker
Multiple field trips on Wednesday will offer extensive networking opportunities for cave and karst professionals. That evening, when the busses return, we will all gather at the convention center for poster sessions in an informal setting. Image courtesy of Matt Selig, Indiana Karst Conservancy.
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Nevada's Lovelock Cave is one of the most important classic sites of the Great Basin archaeological record because conditions of the cave are conducive to the preservation of organic and inorganic material.
In 1911 two miners, David Pugh and James Hart, were hired to mine for bat guano from the cave. They removed a layer of guano estimated to be three to six feet deep and weighing about 250 tons. The miners were aware of the artifacts they were disturbing but, unfortunately, only the most interesting specimens were saved. Archaeologists were quickly alerted to the existence of the cave where they found 11 pre-historic duck decoys stored inside two woven baskets.
The cave was placed on the National Register of Historic Places on May 24, 1984. It was the first major cave in the Great Basin to be excavated.
Advance registration for the 2025 symposium is expected to open in mid-2024. We will send an email to past attendees when that system comes online.
Feel free to join our mailing list if you would like to receive occasional updates on our plans.