Andalee Rosier age 8. of Hollywood Cal, for her question:
How do they make caves?
Cave exploring is exciting, You feel breathless wonder as you stand in a vast cathedral cavern. You laugh with the bubbling underground waterfall. You love the mystery of the winding tunnels. You are amazed at the hanging stalactites, the spikey stalagmites. There is sweet music when you tap the columns that grow from floor to ceiling when the spikes and stony icicles meet.
There are scares too. Suddenly there is a whirr of wings. A dark form swoops downs dips over your shoulder and disappears into an eerie niche. Of course it was only a bat and these underground caves are his rightful home, so that scare does not last.
Soon you begin to wonder, who made these caves these endless tunnel. Maybe they were dug out by the cavemen of long ago. Our cavemen ancestors could cope with wild animals and a bitter climate but they could not have built these magnificent caves, Sometimes though they used them as homes.
The caves were built by Mother Natures running waters. You might suppose that teeming torrents were needed for the job. Sometimes a water fall or strong river did lend a hand. But most of the work was done by little raindrops, Naturally it takes billions of raindrops and thousands of rainy seasons to hollow out a big cavern, But that is how the job is done.
Water falls until it hits a floor. If it is also trapped there by solid walls it stays put. If the floors or walls are spongey it‑seeps through, taking its time, If it can find a hole in its prison it leaks right out. This you know, You also know that water melts some things and dissolves others, This fallen rain water takes its time, but its long range plan is to keep rolling downwards until it finally joins the sea.
The rain falls and comes to a stop when it hits the ground, Some rolls down solid slopes and joins small streams, Hundreds of these join to form a river that carries the water out to the sea. Some falls on spongy dirt and seeps down, Part of this is used by the thirsty plants, Part sinks deeper to form the ground water,
Some rainwater falls on rocks full of little pores and winding crevices. This is the water that sinks down to make our caves, Down it seeps chipping and dissolving the rocks as it goes, At last the dripping water is stopped by a rocky slab„ It has found a floor and goes no deeper. It puddles and flows or rolls down the sloping slab, It totes along chips and dissolved rock. It may form a stream and wear out a tunnel. All the time the drip' drill drip is wearing away the rock to form a hole ‑ a cave, and finally a vast cavern,
After millions of showers and thousands of years a whole network of caves and tunnels is worn through the underground rocks, The ceiling wears thinner and thinner and, sooner or later, the cave will collapse. This is one reason we should never go cave exploring alone. We need an expert with us who knows what's what and also the way out of our wonderland.