About
West Virginia has many of the most extensive cave systems in the eastern United States as it contains thousands of caves ranging from small crawls to massive underground rooms, which are concentrated in the karst limestone geology of the state's eastern ranges.
The West Virginia Cave Conservancy (WVCC) works to protect these resources through education, land acquisition, conservation easements, and access agreements with private landowners. WVCC owns or holds conservation interests in dozens of cave and karst preserves across West Virginia and Virginia protecting them from damage, commercial development, and indiscriminate human impact.
Caving is a niche pursuit, but the ecosystems WVCC protects are anything but niche. Caves are home to bat populations, rare invertebrates, aquifer systems, and geological formations that took millions of years to form. WVCC's work ensures that the growing interest in outdoor recreation in the Virginias doesn't come at the expense of one of the states' most fragile and irreplaceable natural resources.
