Get Down Cave is one of the local caves managed by Texas Cave Management Association (TCMA) and the City of Austin. This news article will explain the biology, geology, and history of Get Down Cave.
The entrance is a shallow sink which is 15 feet in diameter. There are two holes which lead down from the sink. One of these holes is a passage which ends after only a few feet. The other hole extends 30 feet into a passage below the surface into a breakdown. Holes in the breakdown extend no further than 10 feet. There is calcite breakdown on the floor of this cave. Fine silt covers the floor in some areas. The inside has underhanging walls. Get Down Cave is a collapse sinkhole as evidenced by the underhanging walls of the entrance room. (Ref: ftp://ftp.austintexas.gov/GIS-Data/WCD/WCD/Req/The_Caves_of_the_Balcones_Conservation_Plan.pdf)
Get Down Cave opens to an entrance room that ends into a rocky pit. The entrance room descends to the main level of the cave. This area has a constant 100 percent humidity and total darkness. Live Oak Cave and Senatorial Sink are located east of Live Oak Cave and Senatorial Sink. (Ref: https://repositories.lib.utexas.edu/bitstream/handle/2152/22314/Perrone-2008.pdf?sequence=2)
Get Down Cave serves as a preserve for rare karst invertebrate species that would otherwise go extinct with the development and sprawl of urbanization. Get Down Cave is home to the rare species such as the ground beetle, Rhadine austinica, the millipede Speodesmus, and the harvestman Texella. (Ref: https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download;jsessionid=F2A679B4B237FCBCAD71D8C14A0BD58E?doi=10.1.1.692.9179&rep=rep1&type=pdf)
Wildlife species inhabiting this cave are spiders, millipedes, cave crickets, and ground beetles. There are supposedly flies around this cave too. Get Down Cave contains several cave adapted species, three of which are designated by the USFWS as “species of concern”. These include a millipede, Speodesmus ns, a harvestman, Texella ns, and a ground beetle, Rhadine austinica. Get Down Cave is home to the fast moving, elusive Rhadine Beetle, classified as a species of concern by US Fish and Wildlife. (Ref: https://www.tcmacaves.org/download/88/passages/2089/passages-2002-vol-3-no-2.pdf)
Here is the history of Get Down Cave.
Get Down Cave was discovered by Tom Thornhill and by surveyors during the early development of the Circle C neighborhood. in 1985 while out caving. He was the first person known to have discovered this Get Down Cave. Biological collections were made and surveyed by James Reddell and Marcelino Reyes a year or so later. Get Down Cave was once privately owned then. (Ref: ftp://ftp.austintexas.gov/GIS-Data/WCD/WCD/Req/The_Caves_of_the_Balcones_Conservation_Plan.pdf)
An oil spill occurred near Get Down Cave in 1986. This led environmentalists to be concerned because Get Down Cave contained “species of concern”.
On May 27, 1986, the 24-inch Shell Pipeline Company’s Rancho Pipeline in Travis County was ruptured during the construction of Slaughter Lane. 2,300 barrels of crude oil were released and ran downhill almost to Slaughter Creek, where the oil was contained by a dirt dike. Hydrocarbon fumes were detected in Get Down Cave after District Park Cave was subsequently investigated for fumes. Reports of an odor smelling like “lighter fluid” were detected in Get Down Cave.(Ref: ftp://ftp.ci.austin.tx.us/wildland/Balcones_Canyonland_Preserve/BCP%20Land%20Management%20Plan%20August%202007_2012MAY_DPG/Tier%20II%20Management%20Handbook/Tier%20IIA-9%20Karst%20Management.pdf)
Levels of hydrocathon fumes have been documented in and near caves containing species of concern such as Get Down Cave and Midnight Cave following a petroleum pipeline spill in 1986. The oil spill had affected a number of caves in southern Travis County. (Ref: https://wimberleywatershed.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/Exhibit-B-Zara-Report-on-Pipeline-Risks-to-Species.pdf)
Apparently, considerable amounts of petroleum had ponded in the low end of the spill area, and were able to penetrate into the subsurface. Water from heavy rains soon after the spill carried the oil along the Kirschberg Zone to the northeast. This oil was trapped in "sumps" along the base of the solution zone, where the water enters poorly-developed lower level passages. The oil traps most distant from the spill, located near Get Down and District Park Caves, were filled by high flows that produced more water than the lower conduits near the oil spill could carry. (Ref: https://digital.lib.usf.edu/content/SF/S0/05/51/17/00001/K26-04668-1987-v32-n02.pdf)
TCMA partnered up with local developer, Lumberman's Investment Corp., for a proposed cave preserve at the Village of Western Oaks in 1998. The preserve would include Get Down Cave, Equinox Cave, Live Oak Cave, Survey Line Cave, and Senatorial Sink (Senatorial Sink Cave). Mike Warton gated all 5 caves in 1999. A management plan was developed for the preserve as coordinated by the City of Austin.
However due to the lack cave management on of the part of the city and developer, it took nearly 8 years to gain full ownership, land rights, and mineral rights to the preserve. TMCA expressed an interest in owning and managing the preserve many years in advance as they had been the de facto managers for 7½ years.
Get Down Cave was once privately owned by Mel Bilich for 4 years in a preserve once called Mel Bilich Karst Preserve (now Western Oaks Karst Preserve). However mismanagement and neglect lead Get Down Cave to natural decay. Get Down Cave had not been properly managed per the karst preserve obligations prior to 2005. (Ref: https://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GC354B_mel-bilich-karst-preserve-cache)
Western Oaks Karst Preserve would open to the public in 2005. TCMA members would give guided tours of Get Down Cave along with the other caves starting in 2006. (Ref: www.bseacd.org/western_oaks)
Today Get Down Cave is located in a preserve called Western Oaks Karst Preserve with karst features such as Equinox Cave, Live Oak Cave, Survey Line Cave, and Senatorial Sink (Senatorial Sink Cave). TCMA has been managing use of the preserve and monitoring all of those caves. Texas Cave Management Association took up the task of guiding tours of Get Down Cave along with the other caves on the preserve. Get Down Cave is the largest cave on the preserve. 
Get Down Cave is now one of the 62 BCCP caves that protected. BCCP caves usually have some degree of protection although only a few BCCP caves remained ungated. (Ref: http://www.austintexas.gov/edims/document.cfm?id=288326)
Nowadays Get Down Cave is open to the public for just one day a year instead of two days a year. Get Down Cave is usually open during the annual Austin Cave Festival. (Ref: https://www.kvue.com/news/local/stories/102707kvuecavefest-mm.1b28dd99f.html)
However Get Down Cave is open to the public for just one day out of the year for guided tours conducted by TCMA. Now visitors to do not get to explore or tour the entirety of this cave. Visitors are restricted to the entrance room because the cave is home to three species of concern, or species that are severely limited in range such that they may soon be candidates for endangered species listing. (Ref: https://bseacd.org/uploads/BSEACD_AquiferBulletin_Apr2010.pdf)
Get Down Cave is located at 5401 Davis Lane, Austin, Texas, US 78749.
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