Historically, caves have been managed many different ways, from benign neglect to commercialization or other forms of exploitation with widely varying results.
Some people saw commercial potential in caves and the development and profit provided the incentive for ownership and a form of conservation.
This recognition played a part in some significant caves becoming protected through their inclusion in the US national park system.
The same pattern was true as Virginia and northeast area cavers were in the forefront of the founding of the first four cave conservancies.
CCV was founded with the intent of being a cave owning conservancy; however, leadership changes in its early history brought people with a different priority.
Only recently has CCV come back to its original conservancy mission with the purchase of a significant cave property.
Few other conservation societies have a comparable amount of volunteer activity and number and diversity of non-profit organizations in America.
It is not surprising that cave conservancies would eventually be formed and that this movement would start in the United States.
Loss of cave access provides the emotional drive and support needed to motivate and encourage volunteer work and funding.
Support for the movement also comes from people who envision the cave resource as a tool with which to educate for science and conservation.
Dues, donations, major gifts, small fund raising events, raffles, and fees for services are the most widely used means of fundraising in addition to extensive volunteer time, which all cave conservancies receive in significant amounts.
CCV is unique among cave conservancies in that it uses gaming as an effective fund raising tool.
This method lists the six levels one should consider in order when deciding to protect, manage, and conserve a cave.
CCV has devoted resources for many years to educate cave owners and, by implication, endorses enlightened self-management.
Four conservancies, KCI, IKC, MKC, and MAKC have substituted the word "karst" for "cave", perhaps to emphasize their interest in protecting/preserving the broader landscape.
Great Saltpeter Cave Preserve is the only NSS affiliated conservancy that has the type of name that is usually given to a property instead of an organization.
As with land trusts in general, the cave conservancy movement in the United States is growing.
Brewer, Richard, Conservancy: The Land Trust Movement in America, 2003, Dartmouth College/University Press of New England, 348 pp.