MENDIKOL

Herbert Daniel Gebauer - 06/01/2018

A low but wide (8.5 m by 1.1 m), north-west facing cave entrance at the base of a collapse doline functions as a seasonal sink and gives access to about 200 m of cave passage which descends along the local dip (approximately towards south-east or 135° / -15°) of nodular and nummulitic limestone strata and intersects, about 45 m vertically below the cave entrance and at right angles, a cave passage which drains a perennial stream from north-east to south-west.Not exactly enthusiatic sports cavers followed the stream cave passage first upstream to an unpushed duck and then downstream till the carbide lamps began to fail ––allegedly due to excessive carbon dioxide. Annie U. Audsley in JARRATT & AUDSLEY (2002) narrates how these caves were surveyed quickly [sic!] by us splitting into two teams and things got particularly exciting when we had to drag Mark away from surveying the lower reaches of Mendi, whish were lacking in oxygen … SITUATION: According to GPS readings of disputable reliablity, at an approximate linear distance of 0.5 km north of Asakgre- Imandura Hat (market) or 1 km north-west of the I.B. (Inspection Bungalow). To find the cave, a guide is essential. CAVE DESCRIPTION: Two parallel cliff faces (050° / -90°), about 10 m apart, delimit a doline (10 by 20 m wide, 5 m deep) with an 8 m wide but 1 m low entrance to a hands and knees crawl to stooping high passage that soon enlarges to a walking sized cave passage. This descends, with a few easily climbable 1 to 2 m drops, on average by some 15° to a depth of 42 m below the entrance --encountering some decaying calcite bridges and flowstone remnants (speleothems). At the bottom, it joins a NE - SW running horizontal passage containing standing water, mud, bat guano. CAVE LIFE: Bats (Chiroptera), crickets, one greyish-coloured slug with crested back.