Cave Spring, at milepost 308.4 of the Natchez Trace Parkway in Tishomingo County, is a collapsed limestone cave. Underground water dissolved a cavern out of the rock until the roof weakened and fell in, leaving a sinkhole bordered by the cave openings. It lies in the northeastern corner of Mississippi, the only part of the state where Paleozoic rock reaches the surface. The 1969 Geologic Map of Mississippi places the site on Mississippian rocks of the Chester Group, sandstone, shale and limestone more than 320 million years old.
The damp, shaded walls of the cave opening carry a plant community otherwise known from the sandstone rockhouses of the Cumberland Plateau in Kentucky, Tennessee and northern Alabama. The Park Service vegetation mapping project, published in 2016, sampled it at cave openings in Tishomingo County and called the Cave Spring occurrence a range extension for the type. It is a sparse layer of Appalachian rockhouse ferns over mats of mosses and liverworts.
A short paved walk of about 250 feet, with stairs, leads down to the cave mouth, and the cave can also be viewed from above. For safety the Park Service warns against drinking the water or entering the cave.
Getting there
34.6432, -88.1409
Locations are approximate and may be inaccurate, on private land, or otherwise inaccessible. Check before you travel.
Hear it from the road
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