Searching for Karst in the Pryor Mountains, Montana

By Ashley Adkins
Edited by Daniel White

Four people standing next to a sign next to a truck. — *Kayla Maher, Anna Reachmack, Ashley Adkins Irons, and Melissa Gundersen posing around a welcome sign to the Pryor Mountains on a training trip.  Photo courtesy Ashley Adkins Irons.*

Nestled between the Bighorn Mountains to the east and the Beartooth Mountains to the west, the Pryor Mountains are a rugged high desert range in southeastern Montana. The range is located within a mosaic of portions of the Custer Gallatin National Forest, the Crow Indian Reservation and private land. Exploring this rugged terrain is the Pryor Mountains cave crew, a group of four individuals hoping to discover and inventory karst features in the range. Our team lead is Melissa Gundersen, a Forest Service geologist who works under FS geologist and Region 1 cave and karst coordinator Dan Seifert and is excited to lead this crew for the first time. Kayla Maher is our GeoCorps Intern, and serving through Montana Conservation Corps are the author and Anna Reachmack as a Conservation Intern and Conservation Fellow, respectively. While our crew may have differing backgrounds, we are all new to conducting cave inventory.

When telling someone I work on a cave crew the usual reaction is first surprise about caving in general, followed by curiosity about what that actually means. So, what exactly are we doing? 

Our day to day operations usually consist of travelling to predetermined areas of geological interest and ridgewalking with our tablets looking for caves. The focus so far has been to search the limestone of the Madison Formation. If we are able to locate a cave with one or more significant criteria our goal would be to nominate that site for an official designation as a significant cave as described in the Federal Caves Resources Protection Act. We also conduct visitor impact studies on well-known caves in the Pryor Mountains to track recreational usage.

During our training we worked with members of the Northern Rocky Mountain Grotto and past members of the 2018 and 2019 cave crews to improve our vertical caving techniques. These skills have already proved useful on recent trips to Red Pryor Ice Cave and Bighorn Cavern and will come in handy during our exploration of the typically inaccessible terrain of the Pryor Mountains.  Past crew members have also assisted us with focusing on where to continue the search this summer and tips for travelling the high desert. 

Two people posing within a connected karst feature. — *Anna Reachmack and Melissa Gunderson posing within a connected karst feature. Photo courtesy Ashley Adkins Irons.*

A person ridgewalking after discovering a new cave. — *Ridgewalking with Ashley Adkins Irons after discovering a new cave. Photo courtesy Ashley Adkins Irons.*

With this encouragement we feel positive about our summer of exploration in the Pryor Mountains and look forward to seeing what we can find.

My contact information is: 
Ashley Adkins Irons, Conservation Intern for Montana Conservation Corps
A.adkins615@gmail.com