The National Cave and Karst Research Institute (NCKRI) is a nexus of research, stewardship, outreach and information for caves and karst while fostering interdisciplinary collaborations. The institute was created by the US Congress in 1998 in partnership with the National Park Service, State of New Mexico, and the City of Carlsbad.
NCKRI is located in Carlsbad, NM, and is a research center of the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology.
Join us for NCKRI's Coffee & Karst at NCKMS!
On Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday, from 8AM-9AM, grab a cup of coffee and join fellow cave and karst professionals for informal, yet serious discussions on the real-world challenges facing our community.
Have a challenge you're facing? Share it with us in advance or bring it to the session. Chances are, someone else has dealt with it - and has insights to share.
Several tables will be set up each day, and each table will focus on specific topics. We'll keep the coffee flowing until your questions find answers! (And yes, of course we'll have doughnuts!!)
Topics will be crowd-sourced from participants and focused on solutions. Topics may include issues like:
Mitigating cave damage after wildfires
Repairing broken cave formations
How to install a new lighting system
Managing public access in sensitive areas
...or anything you bring to the tables!
Whether you're a new cave manager or a seasoned expert, NCKRI's Coffee & Karst is a space to exchange ideas, troubleshoot tough problems, and build connections over caffeine.
These sessions are built on the idea that some of the best solutions may not come from formal presentations, but from honest conversations among peers. Whether it's a new trustee program, an experimental technique, or a hard-earned lesson learned from the real world, your experience could be exactly what someone else needs to hear.
NCKRI's Coffee & Karst is designed to be casual, inclusive, and participant-driven - no microphones, no slide decks, just good conversation and a shared desire to support one another. Whether you come with a question or an answer (or both), you'll be helping build a stronger, more connected cave and karst management community.
We hope to see you there!
Don't be silly... Of course we'll have doughnuts! Image courtesy of Dave Crosby, CC/Wikimedia.
The official event schedule for the 2025 NCKMS has now been updated. Please check our schedule page or download a PDF to your mobile device.
The Cave Research Foundation is a private, non-profit organization dedicated to:
Facilitating research, management and interpretation of caves and karst resources; Forming partnerships to study, protect and preserve cave resources and karst areas; Promoting the long term conservation of caves and karst ecosystems.
The Hydrographic Great Basin is a 200,000 square mile area of the American West that extends from the Sierra Nevada Range in California to the Wasatch Range in Utah, and from southern Oregon to southern Nevada. The entire basin contains what's called an endorheic watershed. All precipitation in this region evaporates, sinks underground, or flows into lakes. No water reaches the ocean.