How many limestone caves are there in the United States of America?

Question

In terms of larger lakes in the United States, there are 123, 439 according to the EPA.

So what about caves?

Source(s):

http://www.epa.gov/owow/lakes/lakessurve

or if that website on lakes does not work, then do a google on: "selection of sampling locations for the Survey"

Answer 1

The number is in the thousands, if not hundreds of thousands. It is probably impossible to derive an accurate number because many caves may be known only to a few people, and many caves interconnect so names used for cave entrances often are later discovered to be part of the same cave system. Mammoth Cave in Kentucky is an excellent example of a cave that has now been connected and mapped to several other major caves in the area.

A recent published paper compiled a distribution map of the caves in the United States and used 45,000 known caves in the lower 48 states. They found that one third of the counties in the US have at least one cave. Here is the paper:
http://www.caves.org/pub/journal/PDF/V61/v61n3-Culver.pdf

Answer 2

5

Answer 3

who knows how many there are and are yet to be discovered

but...

Bedford Indiana is the limestone capitol of the world...might start there

Answer 4

yes indeed, many thousands that are already surveyed and more that havent been discovered yet

Answer 5

It seems you already answered your main question.

As to your follow up, so, what about them? What is the question?

Answer 6

Do you want me to include the hundreds of thousands that have not been discovered yet.................

Answer 7

many many thousands that people know about, and many more that nobody knows about