Country diary: cave secrets of lost charismatic carnivores

Kinsey Cave, Yorkshire Dales: Bones of brown bear and lynx found here have rewritten the histories of both speciesI walk over the exposed hillside above Giggleswick Scar and push past the elder crowding the entrance to Kinsey cave. The dripping limestone grotto, like many of Craven's karst caves, has been a time capsule, trapping evidence of the human and natural past in sediment and protecting it from the passage of glaciers. It is an unassuming space, but one that reverberates with significance in the debate around rewilding. Two of Britain's lost charismatic carnivores - the lynx and the brown bear - made their last known appearance here.I am not sure what I expect to find. It's not as though there are archaeological gems scattered over the floor; Kinsey has been excavated from the Victorian era onwards, and the findings have either been lost or stashed in archives. But among the latter are the bones of both brown bear and lynx, native animals we extirpated from these shores. It was once thought their British extinctions occurred in the bronze age, but research into the discoveries made in Kinsey cave has rewritten the histories of both species. Continue reading...