Worksheet - PDF

							White Scar
Britain's Longest Show Cave
Ingleton, North Yorkshire LA6 4AW Telephone: 01 524 241244

Worksheet
Key Stage t,5-7 years

National Curriculum

Finding your Way
Maps help us find our way and to remember places we have seen. White Scar Caves are very long, this is just a map of the parts you visited.
Sword of Damocles

The Show Cave
Tbur End 1925*90 Buddha

Battlefield Cavern

Arum Lily

Crown of Thorns Bagshaw T\rnnel

Silver Tbrrent

Grotto
Gorilla Walk Wdterfall
Witch's Fingers

Pulpit Rock

Based on a survey by

Long's Gallery

DrA. C. Waltham

The Explorer
1920s T\rnnel

Make a mark on the map (X) where you saw the model of Christopher Long, the man who found the caves.

How does a Gorilla Walk?
Draw lines to complete the names of some of the places or things to be seen
in the cave. One has been done for you.

Stones that Grow
Dripping water in the cave leaves stone behind. Stalactites hang down from the ceiling and stalagmites grow up
from the ground. They take many years to grow. Label the picture.

Arum
Bagshaw

Cavern Thorns

Battlefield Crown of Gorilla
Long's

Lily
Damocles Rock

Pulpit
Silver
Sword of Witch's

Gallery Walk
T\rnnel Fingers

Torrent

Straw Stalactites This is a picture of a straw stalactite. It is
hollow and water nrns slowly through it. As the drips dry, they leave bestone called calcite and make the tube longer.

Christopher Francis Drake Long
Draw a picture to show what he was wearing when he discovered White Scar Caves in 1923.

hind a ring of white

Drop of Water

Measure

this

straw.

How long is it?

Some Problems to Think About
Guess how long it was when you were born?

r'

Why are stalactites usually longer and thinner than stalagmites, most of which are short and thick?

0cm
1cm

5cm
10 cm

T T T

n

What did you see living in the cave? Why did it live where you saw it? How did it get there? Some of the passages you walked through were natural, others were man-made. How could you tell?
How do you think Christopher Long felt on the day he found the caves?

@

White Scar Caves Ltd.-though educational instinrrtions are welcome !o reproduce this worksheet for use in connection with study visits.

White Scar
Britain's Longest Show Cave
Ingleton, North Yorkshire LA6 4AW Telephone: 01 524 241244

Worksheet
National Curriculum
Key Stage 2,8-LL years

The Cave and its Formations
Making plans of cave systems is diffrcult. This one is based on a 100m grid.

The Cave System
Northern Line Arum Lily

Second Front

Tbur End 1925-90

Long's Gallery

1925 T\lnne]
Based on a survey by Dr A. C. Waltham

0

Use the grid references to help you mark these features on the plan. Waterfall GR 1411
Bagshaw

planto find the grid references for these features or places.
Use the

Foxhole

GRGR GR

TU.nnel

GR 4625
GR 0003 GR 2118

Entrance Buddha

Sword of Damocles GR 2926

Battlefield Cavern GR 5124 How can grid references be made more accurate?

-Arum Lily GRLongis Gallery GRSecond Front (start) GR -

(entrance) Tour End L925-90
Grotto

Geology & White Scar
Use the clues to solve this puzzle:

L. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.

Dark rock, easily split into slabs.
Organic remains turned to stone.

Stalactites, for example. A large cave e.g. Battlefield
Exposed limestone outcrop.

In geolory, layers of rock. Slate or shale, for example. In White Scar, the Bagshaw
Very cold periods of time.

If your answers are right, the letters in the grey squares name a kind of rock.

Cave Life
Several kinds of living things inhabit the caves. Write the names of three ofthem.

For each, give reasons why you think they were living where you noticed them.

Try to explain how each kind of organism might have arrived in the caves.

With the help of reference books, make careful drawings of each type of organism.

@

White Scar Caves Ltd.-though educational institutions are welcome

tro

reproduce this worksheet for use in connection with study visits,

White Scar
Britain's Longest Show Cave
Ingleton, North Yorkshire LA6 4AW Telephone: 01 524 241244

Worksheet
National Curriculum
Key Stage 3,L2-Lfyears

Water and Limestone
White Scar Caves were created by the action of water on the Great Scar Limestone rock. The slow processes which began some 200,000 years ago continue to develop the caves and calcite formations within them. The sectional drawing below shows that the caves occupy various levels within the limestone. The cave system is very much larger than that to which the public has access and extends beyond the Battlefield Cavern towards Crina Bottom.

on through White Scars to Crina
Chapel le Dale

Bottom
Mines

scate:

100 metres

i i'ii

iii:

white

S"ur. i

".ad

Moss

i

Crina

Bottom

-

jlngleborough

Boggart's Roaring Hole

Cave Entrance

Bmed on the work of DrA. C. Waltham

Key: Slates & Grits FrZl Limestone l ---l

Shales

filln

Abandoned Cave

[---l

Stream Cave

Known

Link

....-..

What does the shape of the exposed slate and grit stratum in the Chapel le Dale area suggest?

The higher level caves do not have streams running through them, so how might they have been formed?

-

Look at the profile of the upper surface of the lime.
stone in Crina Bottom. What does that reveal?

Do you think there may be undiscovered caves beneath Lead Mines Moss? Why, or why not?

Man's lnfluence
To improve access, Christopher Long's entrance crawl

was enlarged and the Bagshaw Tunnel was driven through to the Battlefreld Cavern. What evidence of mining did you see in the tunnels?

Some of the formations have suffered as a result of accidental damage and vandalism. What reasonable

precautions can be taken to prevent this without ruining the atmosphere for visitors?

How is

it possible to tell which tunnel is the older?

How might a broken stalactite be repaired?

Straw Stalactites
These delicate features, also
known ascave straws, are socalled
because they are hollow. Water flows through the centre of each straw and, as drips evaporate from

the end, deposits calcite around the rim gradually lengtheningthe tube. The local growth rate is quite fast, roughly 40cm per 1-000 years.
These strange formations are often far from being simple, vertical

tubes. The diagram opposite shows just three of the variations which can occur. The processes
involved are not very clear. How do you think each of these variants might have been formed?

Why are stalactites often found along straight lines?

Why are some calcite formations coloured?

Water, water everywhere...
The mean rate of flow of water through the system is 0.09 m3 sec'l, some of which supplies local needs. In an average day, how many litre bottles could be sold?

Features of White Scar
Hidden below are the names of seventeen of the features of the caves. They are all in straight lines but may be written in any direction. Good hunting!
B B P P
U L P

T
R

What have you assumed in reaching your answer?

o c
K

B A M M T E o R T T o A M M T H E G R o T T o E P G G H M P S P P M M V D P L S H H H P I M M A E A L o o H H P tl M T A E o N H H A R I G T Y H S N G G A R A E T T H E M T S G G R A T T T H E F A S G G R R A A U N N X o X R A A G R A V V N N c X D L L T T R E E V N N H H R L S L A A N V E E E o D K E E L L A A A R U M L I

N J I U T U D D

rA rA

I I

S

\

Y K R S S S K A K K Y S S K K S K K Y Y H K F S S N R o H T F N N N S L V E B N N T S V V
B A T T L E F
I

D G H T L] E E c M S F H o H E S c E F H A D I D D L' N D D G G D L Y E L L R L A U U E E L L Y S L A t A L L R o G K A A A A L L R T G o N vl c R c T T T R T o R R E N T N N E R T R R V N N T N E L D c A V E R N T

oc c R
D D

S c F F

A

D

H A D V D c
U

c

B L G E S c

G S G c
E E

N L N c

@

White Scar Caves Ltd.-though educational institutions are welcome to reproduce this worksheet for use in cormection with study visits.

White Scar
Britain's Longest Show Cave
Ingleton, North Yorkshire LA6 4AW Telephone: 01 524 241244

Worksheet
National Curriculum
KeyStage 4,L5-L6years

The Creation of the
White Scar System

Answer the following questions, based on your observations of the White Scar Cave system and the information given below. The Battlefield Cavern

(V) and other parts of the system began to form as phreatic caves in the limestone be200,000 years

What evidence did you find that the Battlefield Cavern was phreatic?

ago Interglacial

tween two depressions on the north-western flanks oflngleborough.

Earlier

glaciations

Why was the valley excavation

so

important

shaped the landscape to

in the cave's history?

some extent, but the
real significance of this

third major glaciation was the excavation of
150,000 years ago

Glacial

the valley of Chapel le Dale (O).

posited in the early parts of the cave sysofuranium traces from
100,000 years aSo Interglacial

Calcite began to be de-

How does the stalagmite evidence help date

the Battlefield Cavern?

tem. Radioactive decay Battlefrel d Cavern stalagmites show them to be this old.
Before the ice returned,

Cave ({t) had begun to form. The ice deepened

the lower or Stream

What effect do you think removal of the
shales had on the caves?

thevalleys and scoured away the shales to ex50,000 years ago

pose
Glacial

the limestone

pavements.

The Water Exit, by
which the stream now leaves the cave from the foot of the First Waterfall, has formed since the ice last retreated. White Scar Caves continue to develop.

How'has the presence of the slate beds
affected cave development?

Modern

Post-glacial

Ice

shales
Limestone
Key

FJ:;::T
FFiffifi.trfr
l....Itlili

Definitions
Phreatic caves are formed by water fl owing under pressure. Roof and fl oor are both eroded and water may be forced upwards creating vertical caves or avens. Vadose caves are formed as canyons, with water from bedding planes eroding faults in the floor and producing a typical T-shaped crosssection, just as can be seen in the active Stream Cave at White Scar.

,Slates & Grits V77m7

Cave Chemistry
Complete the paragraph opposite

to explain how the White Scar formations were created. The
words needed are given below:
acidic, bicarbonate, capacity, calcium, carbon, carbonate, calcite, crystalline, dioxide, fissures, green, grey, insoluble, iron, vegetation

Limestone is almost entering the cave through water contains and especially from decaying limestone as calcium in the cave, some ofthe carbon
The excess isprecipitated as
of calcium

ln pure w ater, but the rain water is . This
dioxide gathered from the atmosphere in the soil. It dissolves When this solution meets the air
diffuses out reducingthe

of the water to carry

bicarbonate.

,a

form

Calcite is white. What are the causes of each of the black, green, grey, red and yellow tints found in the caves?

The Deposition of the Limestone
The 200m thick band of Great
Scar Limestone in which the caves

How long did

it take for the Great

Scar Limestone to accumulate?

have been formed was created during the Carboniferous Period. The skeletal remains of marine animals accumulated as mud on the floor ofa shallow tropical sea.

Under the pressure of later sediments including the Coal
Measures, the ooze recrystallised as limestone. The rate of deposi-

What have you assumed in making the above calculations?

tion in today's shallow tropical

seas, e.g. the Bahamas Banks in the Western Atlantic, is around 1cm in 400 years.

Running a Show Cave
White Scar offers a particularly interesting opportunity for the general public to visit a cave and gain some understanding of the ways in which caves are formed. In any such undertaking, the safety of the public must be assured.Fromtimetotime,specificconcernsmayberaised.WritingfromtheviewpointoftheCave SafetyOfficer prepare three statements to allay any worries about eaeh of the following. Use the space below for making notes.

Flooding

,Power Failure

Rockfalls

@

White Scar Caves Ltd.-though educational institutiors are welcome to reproduce this worksheet for use in cormection with study visits.