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Bechan Cave

Bechan Cave is a single-room sandstone rock shelter located at an elevation of 1,280 metres (4, 200 ft) along Bowns Canyon Creek, a tributary of the Glen Canyon segment of the Colorado River, in Kane County in southeastern Utah in the United States. The cave is roughly 31 metres (100 ft) wide, 9 metres (30 ft) high and 52 metres (170 ft) deep. It has a single entrance that faces southwest and is well-lit during the daytime. The cave holds alluvial deposits containing the remains of Pleistocene megafauna, including mammoths, ground sloths, and even-toed ungulates. Archaeological excavation of the site in 1983 and 1984 by paleontologists Larry Agenboard and Jim Mead unearthed animal bones, dung, hair, and teeth dating from 11,555 BCE to 9720 BCE, underneath "a few feet" of cave fill, consisting of ceiling spall and wind-blown sand, containing evidence of Holocene habitation from the Archaic period to the Basketmaker culture and possibly even by Navajo or Paiute. Among the items unearthed were large dung boluses, similar in size to the dung of the African elephant, containing the stems of graminoids and sedge (Carex). The cave is also one of at least seventeen sites on the Colorado Plateau where Archaic-era Southwestern sandals have been discovered. The cave's name derives from a Navajo word meaning "big dung" or "big feces". The well-preserved dung layer was deposited over a

Cave data from Wikidata (CC0). Summary from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA).

More caves in United States

  1. Lechuguilla Cave489 m deep
  2. Carlsbad Caverns National Park333 m deep
  3. Natural Tunnel State Park0.3 km
  4. Merrill Cave0.2 km
  5. Layser Cave0 km

Other notable caves worldwide

  1. Mammoth Cave · Australia686 km
  2. Sistema Sac Actun · Mexico119.2 m
  3. Lechuguilla Cave · United States489 m
  4. Optymistychna Cave · Ukraine20 m
  5. Veryovkina Cave · Georgia2,212 m
  6. Krubera Cave · Georgia2,199 m
  7. Sarma cave · Georgia1,830 m
  8. Clearwater Cave · Malaysia109 km