Treasures of Stump Cross: the wolverine skull

Stump Cross Caverns has been the site of many discoveries over the years. Excavations that have revealed treasures. Our crown jewels, you could say. Our Royal Collection.

Explorers have found the remains of bison, wolves, reindeer and other small mammals in the bowels of the caverns. Aside from being fascinating and beautiful objects, they add to our knowledge and understanding of the earth's history.

That's why the wolverine skull unearthed in 1922 is on proud display in our visitors' centre. But the remains aren't complete – some of them are now exhibited at London's Natural History Museum.

When you visit the caverns, you'll see the Wolverine Cavern – a glorious chamber filled with limestone pillars, jumbled boulders and a chandelier of stalactites.

But before we dig into the story of the skull's discovery, let's get our facts straight. What exactly is a wolverine?

A brief introduction to the wolverine

Wolverines used to roam the British Isles – but they went extinct around 6,000 years ago.

There are still tens of thousands of wolverines worldwide, mainly living in the boreal forests, taiga and tundra of Europe, Asia and North America. There are somewhere between 15,000 and 30,000 of them alive today.

Wolverines are bear-like. But you may be surprised to learn that they're actually the largest member of the weasel family.

They're solitary creatures – and like all creatures who survive alone, they're tough as nails. They roam in wide open spaces looking for food and are extremely hard to spot in the wild.

Dinner for a wolverine errs on the meaty side. While their summer diet does include plants and berries, they tend to hunt rabbits, rodents and even caribou. In fact, the Latin name for wolverine – gulo – translates as "glutton". These creatures have big appetites.

They take what they can find – sometimes feasting on the corpses of elk and deer, sometimes burrowing underground to catch hibernating mammals. Their powerful jaws can chomp through bones. This gets them through the hard winter months.

It's amazing to imagine a wolverine roaming the Yorkshire Dales, but in prehistoric times they were relatively common.

Today, wolverines are found in arctic and alpine regions – so the fact they lived in the British Isles so many thousands of years ago is another piece of evidence that the climate must have been much, much colder.

Wolverine facts

• Scientific name: Gulo gulo
• Type: Mammal
• Diet: Omnivorous
• Average life span: seven to 12 years
• Size relative to a six-foot man: about knee-height
• Weight: 10 to 18 kilograms

The discovery of the wolverine skull

We have a caver named Christopher Long to thank for the discovery of the wolverine skull. He also discovered many of the passageways that you can now visit.

Christopher Long was a medical student at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, who had a passion for caving – and money. After visiting the show caves in Somerset, he was determined to find one that he could monetise.

He enlisted four of his fellow students to visit Stump Cross and see what they could find. Their mission was to excavate the vast swathes of mud in "the Clay Level" and find out exactly what else was buried there.

Their mission became a marathon, as they dug for nearly 168 hours. In the process, they uncovered around 30 metres of passageways and a huge amount of decorations – stalagmites, stalactites and flowstone.

A few months later, he returned for a solo venture that led him as far as an underground sump. He also claimed to have uncovered an underground lake – but when the owner of the caves refused to cut him into a deal, he blocked up the entrance and remained cagey about its whereabouts.

As well as discovering chambers, grottoes and stalactites, he and his fellow cavers found the remains of reindeer and wolverines, which gave the chambers their names.

He's also said to have found "a series of grottoes, where the walls reverberated to the beat of the explorer's heart". When you visit, can you hear the same thing?

Further discoveries

Long wasn't the only caver to discover remains in Stump Cross. Further remains were found in 1956, 1962, 1980 and 1981 – and a wolverine tibia was found in one of the show caves as recently as 2011.

Cavers and speleologists are still exploring the caverns to see what else can be found – and it's highly likely that more remains will be found.

Another discovery at Stump Cross was the fragment of a Stone Age flint tool. This was dug up by members of the Craven Pothole Club in 2021. It was probably used for hunting wild horses in the Creswellian era – somewhere between 13,000 and 11,800 BP.

What were wolverines doing in the caves?

At this point, you might be wondering what the wolverines were doing in the caves at all.

They were probably looking for food, the old gluttons – but we're sad to say that our wolverines didn't die peacefully after a pleasant day's roaming. The reality is somewhat grislier.

Palaeontologists suggest the wolverines were trapped in the caves during a period of low-level flooding. They died of either starvation or drowning.

Their floating carcasses were scavenged by other carnivores – including fellow wolverines, who cannibalised wolverine corpses to avoid starvation.

It's incredible to think that their remains have survived to this day – and that these prehistoric creatures can be seen in museums and gift shops.

So there you have it – one of the treasures of Stump Cross Caverns. We're not going to lie – we're proud of our wolverine. When you visit our gift shop, can you find it?

Stump Cross Caverns is an underground network of ancient caves in Yorkshire, hidden deep beneath the Dales. As well as offering self-guided tours, we host a range of experiences and events – from fossil digs to corporate hire, from panning for gems to children's parties.

Book now – and get ready for adventure!