This is going to be a somewhat different ANDYSEZ. First of all I am going to talk about an important workshop that I have been involved with over the last three days. Then I am going to exposure you to CULTURE!

Elery Hamilton-Smith has been working with the World Bank and the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) for a number of years. Some of this work has been developing environmental guidelines for limestone quarrying in Asia.

Noting the fact that the Australian Banana Republic could well benefit from some holistic land use and resource planning initiatives, Elery conceived the idea of getting karsty people together with limestone miners to establish common ground. As Australia is actually six states and several territories with less legislatively in common than some aspects of the European Economic Community this seemed to be a "courageous" (in the "Yes, Minister" sense) act!

So, about twenty of us gathered at Charles Sturt University at Bathurst in early November 2000. Elery circulated a discussion paper that established the basis of the workshop as:

"Australia has experienced some 30 years of conflict [some might argue that conflict over Bungonia (South Marulan) goes back sixty years] over the extraction of limestone for cement and lime, for agricultural lime production and various other purposes. This has caused immense costs to both quarry owners and to conservationists; and often the conflict has not served either party, nor the environment, well.

This workshop will attempt to address these limestone resource management issues. Its aims are:

• To establish a better basis for communication and joint resource management planning between quarry operators and those interested in the conservation of limestone areas.
• To develop an agreed policy and practice document which will provide guidelines for the identification of appropriate sites for limestone extraction and the utilisation of the most effective and environmentally responsible quarrying practices."

Some might well argue that the above premises are loaded against limestone miners?

In any event we gathered at Charles Sturt University under the aegis of Elery and Dr Al Gibbs, Head of the Environmental Studies Unit at Charles Sturt University, to discuss the aims outlined above.

Another set of meetings, I said! Further sets of lunchtime sandwiches! Renewed attempts passing-off brown liquids as coffee! Motherhood statements to be generated? Well, it was all of this and more - much more.

It was great gathering. I renewed friendships with a number of limestone botherers, some geological bureaucrats, some karst "gods" and a variety of other people. The discussions were good and balanced with considerable acceptance of other's views.

Let's look at who was there. Their affiliations are as claimed by each individual!

Ken Grimes,   Regolith Mapping/ACKMA
Glenn Porter,   Carbonne Shire Council - Molong Limestone Quarry
Bill Marshall,   Blue Circle Southern Cement
Lawrence Sherwin (part),   NSW Dept of Mineral Resources
Elery Hamilton-Smith,   Rethink Consulting Pty Ltd/ACKMA
Ernst Holland (part),   retired (formerly Jenolan Caves Reserve Trust)/ACKMA
Roger Mathews,   SA Dept of Primary Industries and Resources
Tony Smurthwaite,   Land Access Branch, WA Dept of Minerals and Energy
Kay Oxley (part),   NSW Dept of Mineral Resources
Al Gibbs,   Environmental Studies Unit, Charles Sturt University
Andy Spate,   NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service/ACKMA
Nigel Beeke,   David Mitchell Ltd (Tamworth)
Armstrong Osborne,   University of Sydney/ACKMA
John Dunkley (part),   Australian Speleological Federation Inc.
Jamie Gibbins,   David Mitchell Ltd (Riverton)
Stuart Ritchie,   Queensland Cement Limited
Grant Gartrell,   ACKMA
John Quirke,   South Australia
Arthur Clarke,   University of Tasmania/ACKMA
Bruce Howlett (part),   Australian Speleological Federation Inc.
Mia Thurgate (part),   Jenolan Caves Reserve Trust/ACKMA
Susan White,   Earth Science Dept, Latrobe University/ACKMA

I have used a lot of space perhaps by giving this list in full. But it is important to recognise the breadth of involvement - and also to identify players who were not represented in any way - the various state planning departments spring speedily to mind. They were invited ...

The workshop commenced with four papers and a MS-Powerpoint presentation. The latter was from the United States Geological Survey and outlined a "Hierarchal systems analysis - one approach to issues in assessing karst areas". This was prepared by Dr William Langer of the USGS and was made available to this workshop and to the Charles Sturt University's Karst Management Course that commences next year. We did not have the opportunity to explore this approach in any great detail but it does appear to be a useful methodology to provide warnings and checklists to the proponents of limestone mining.

The four papers addressed the non-commercial values of caves and karst (A Personal Perspective by Grant Gartrell and The Scientific Perspective by Armstrong Osborne) and industry perspectives (The Approach of QCL - A Direction for the Future by Stuart Ritchie and Environmental Responsibility in a Small Operation by Glenn Porter). The four presentations promoted much discussion - which seemed to weld together the idea that we all needed to work together.

The group then broke into two groups to explore Elery's discussion paper. The intention was, and is, to develop the ideas generated by the World Bank team into a set of ideas, guidelines and recommendations suitable for Australian limestone users (cavers and industry alike) so that conflict is avoided and more sensible resource allocation and use is generated.

On Wednesday we took off to the bush and visited the Limekilns (aka Benglen) Caves area to the north of Bathurst - the site of the first hardrock limestone quarrying on the Australian mainland (and perhaps the first show cave?). Then on to Molong to look at Glenn's operation. This is a limestone quarry producing a variety of limestone products run by the Carbonne Shire Council. It is almost in the township of Molong (the only town in NSW significantly on karst) with the nearest neighbours only a few hundred metres away. A very clean and quiet operation that keeps the municipal rates down! Much interesting karst and palaeokarst in the quarry. Then to Wellington Caves for a superb Dale and Janelle lunch (not sandwiches!). Mike Augee and Armstrong then provided some boffin-background and interest to reinforce karst values to our limestone mining colleagues as we inspected the Phosphate Mine, Cathedral Cave and some "surface" features. And the "sculpture" ...

Thursday - back to workshopping for the morning - establishing the "triple bottom line plus one" (Western Australian Government speak ... - sorry Tony!). The two groups further discussed the draft paper and hacked it about considerably. Elery and Stuart, with input from a few others, are going to further develop the paper for circulation throughout the caving, cave management and limestone using industry.

One of the biggest issues that must be resolved is that of information sharing. Miners want high quality limestone - and that is usually where the cave and karst values are concentrated. We are competing for the same resource. If we don't share our hopes and aspirations and values we are doomed to expensive and - often unproductive - conflict. Miners must learn to share their ideas and values with cavers. And vice versa - caver's values and knowledge can contribute to the knowledge base. Establishing mutual trust and respect is essential.

All-in-all I found it to be a most useful three days - and have high hopes that better dialogue between the two "sides" - I don't really want to use that word - will help us better conserve Australia's caves and karst - and to better sustain the limestone industry that we all utilise every minute of our days.

Now for the CULTURE. I discovered this poem a few years ago and subsequently, and separately, Dave Gillieson used a few lines to set the scene for his book "Caves ..."

In Praise of Limestone

If it form the one landscape that we, the inconstant ones,
Are consistently homesick for, this is chiefly
Because it dissolves in water. Mark these rounded slopes
With their surface fragrance of thyme and, beneath,
A secret system of caves and conduits; hear the springs
That spurt out everywhere with a chuckle,
Each filling a private pool for its fish and carving
Its own little ravine whose cliffs entertain
The butterfly and the lizard; examine this region
Of short distances and definite places:
What could be more like Mother or a fitter background
For her son, the flirtatious male who lounges
Against a rock in the sunlight, never doubting
That for all his faults he is loved; whose works are but
Extensions of his powers to charm? From weathered outcrop
To hill-top temple, from appearing waters to
Conspicuous fountains, from a wild to a formal vineyard,
Are ingenious but short steps that a child's wish
To receive more attention than his brothers, whether
By pleasing or teasing, can easily take.
Watch, then, the bands of rivals as they climb up and down
Their steep stone gennels in twos and threes, at times
Arm in arm, but never, thank God, in step; or engaged
On the shady side of a square at midday in
Voluble discourse, knowing each other too well think
There are any important secrets, unable
To conceive a god whose temper-tantrums are moral
And not pacified by a clever line
Or a good lay: for, accustomed to a stone that responds,
They have never had to veil their faces in awe
Of a crater whose blazing fury could not be fixed;
Adjusted to the local needs of valleys
Where everything can be touched or reached by walking,
Their eyes have never looked into infinite space
Through the lattice-work of a nomad's comb; born lucky,
Their legs have never encountered the fungi
And insects of the jungle, the monstrous forms and lives
With which we have nothing, we like to hope, in common.
So, when one of them goes to the bad, the way his mind works
Remains comprehensible: to become a pimp
Or deal in fake jewellery or ruin a fine tenor voice
For effects that bring down the house, could happen to all
But the best and the worst of us...
That is why, I suppose
The best and the worst never stayed here long but sought
Immoderate soils where the beauty was not so external,
The light less public and the meaning of life
Something more than a mad camp. 'Come!" cried the granite wastes,
'How evasive is your humour, how accidental
Your kindest kiss, how permanent is death.' (Saints-to-be
Slipped away sighing.) 'Come!' purred the clays and the gravels.
'On our plains there is room for armies to drill; rivers
Wait to be tamed and slaves to construct you a tomb
In the grand manner: soft as the earth is mankind and both
Need to be altered.' (Intendant Caesars rose and
Left, slamming the door.) But the really reckless were fetched
By an older colder voice, the oceanic whisper:
'I am the solitude that asks and promises nothing;
That is how I shall set you free. There is no love;
There are only the various envies, all of them sad.'
They were right, my dear, all those voices were right
And still are; this land is not the sweet home that it looks,
Nor is its peace the historical calm of a site
Where something was settled once and for all: A backward
And dilapidated province, connected
To the big busy world by a tunnel, with a certain
Seedy appeal, is that all it is now? Not quite:
It has a worldly duty which in spite of itself
It does not neglect, but calls into question
All the Great Powers assume; it disturbs our rights. The poet,
Admired for his earnest habit of calling
The sun the sun, his mind Puzzle, is made uneasy
By these marble statues which so obviously doubt
His antimythological myth; and these gamins,
Pursuing the scientist down the tiled colonnade
With such lively offers, rebuke his concern for Nature's
Remotest aspects: I, too, am reproached, for what
And how much you know. Not to lose time, not to get caught,
Not to be left behind, not, please! to resemble
The beasts who repeat themselves, or a thing like water
Or stone whose conduct can be predicted, these
Are our Common Prayer, whose greatest comfort is music
Which can be made anywhere, is invisible,
And does not smell. In so far as we have to look forward
To death as a fact, no doubt we are right: But if
Sins can be forgiven, if bodies rise from the dead,
These modifications of matter into
Innocent athletes and gesticulating fountains,
Made solely for pleasure, make a further point:
The blessed will not care what angle they are regarded from,
Having nothing to hide. Dear, I know nothing of
Either, but when I try to imagine a faultless love
Or the life to come, what I hear is the murmur
Of underground streams, what I see is a limestone landscape.

W H Auden