Cueva del Milodón

Cave of the Milodón

Useful Information

photography — Cueva del Milodón, Chile. Public Domain.

Location:	Natales, Magallanes y la Antártica Chilena. From Puerto Natales along Seno de Ultima Esperanza (Last Hope Inlet) past Frigorificos Bories (Bories Cold Storage House). 24 km northwest of Puerto Natales. Footpath to the Cave of the Milodón: 800 m, 30 min. (-51.5652592, -72.6192244)
Open:	All year daily 8:30-18:30, last entry 17:30. Online booking mandatory. [2025]
Fee:	Adults CLP 11.400, Children (13-17) CLP 5.700, Children (0-12) free. Venezuelans: Adults CLP 5.200, Children (13-17) CLP 3.200, Children (0-12) free, Disabled free. [2025]
Classification:	Erosional Cave Sea Cave
Light:	none, bring electric torch.
Dimension:	L=200 m, W=80 m, H=30 m, A=150 m asl
Guided tours:	D=120-180 min.
Photography:	allowed
Accessibility:	partly accessible
Bibliography:	V. Auer, M. Salmi, K. Salminien (1955): Pollen and spore types of Fuego-Patagonia Annales Academiae Scientarum Fennicae. Series A, III, Geologica Geographica 43: 1-14. Calvin J. Heusser (2003) Ice Age Southern Andes: A Chronicle of Paleoecological Events Elsevier, 240 pages ISBN:0444514783
Address:	CONAF Magellan, Av. Bulnes 0309, Punta Arenas, Tel: +56-61-2238554-200. E-mail: Corporatión National Forestal (CONAF), Oficina Provincial de CONAF de Ultima Esperanza, Manuel Baquedano 847, Puerto Natales, Tel: +56-61-2411438. Administrator: Alejandra Olivares Dassonvalle, Tel: +56-96-6682318. E-mail:
As far as we know this information was accurate when it was published (see years in brackets), but may have changed since then. Please check rates and details directly with the companies in question if you need more recent info.

History

1895	Hermann Eberhard found first remains of the Milodón, skin and excrements in excellent state of conservation.
1896	explored by Otto Nordenskjöld.
1899	excavations by Erland and Otto Nordenskjöld, adventurers from Sweden, who found a radius and ulna that they referred to a jaguar.
1899	German naturalist Rodolfo Hauthal finds several isolated postcranial elements coming from a giant felid, he donates them to the Museo de La Plata.
02-JAN-1968	Cueva del Milodón Natural Monument created by the Ministry of Education.

Description

The Cueva del Milodón (Cave of the Milodón) is named after the remains of the prehistoric Milodón (Mylodon darwini) that were found in this cave at the end of the 19th century. It was discovered in 1895 by Hermann Eberhard, the German settler and explorer of Patagonia. He found a large piece of skin of an unidentified animal, it looked quite recent, and he mentioned that it was not from any animal he knew. It took some years and scientific work to determine that the skin belonged to a Milodón, a large herbivorous mammal. The Milodón was a very large herbivore and went extinct at the end of the Pleistocene around 10,000 BP. However, in the 19th century some scientists guessed that the Milodón might still live in remote areas of Patagonia. The finding of this skin thus aroused interest among scientists and the site became the target of study by scientists from different disciplines. At the cave entrance stands a huge monument showing a Milodón in original size. It’s as big as a large bear and looks similar, but it is actually a large ground sloth.

Actually it should be named Caves of the Milodón, as there are three caves, Cueva del Milodón, Cueva del Medio, and Cueva Chica. Cueva del Milodón is the largest of these caves, and is just a huge chamber with an enormous portal, about 80 m wide, 30 m high and 200 m long. Today no remains of man or animal are still in the cave, it was completely excavated. There are numerous other archaeological and palaeontological sites at cliffs and shelter, Pedro Cárdenas, Ovejas Muertas, Cascada and Abraigo Silla del Diablo, to name a few.

The site revealed a huge number of now extinct animals. There is for example the Patagonian panther (Panthera onca mesembrina), an extinct subspecies of jaguar (Panthera onca) that was endemic to southern Patagonia during the late Pleistocene. The first remains were found here in 1899, and the naturalist Santiago Roth thought they might be the bones of the mythological iemisch of Tehuelche folklore. But a later expedition recovered more bones and finally Angel Cabrera described it in detail in 1934. With a size of twice the largest living jaguars, it was the largest jaguar ever and one of the heaviest known felids. Even fragments of skin were found, and so we know that it was dark red with lighter, yellowish stripes on its forelimbs. It was thus possible to recognize the animal on cave paintings made by indigenous peoples in the El Ceibo. Excavations also revealed the remains of dwarf horse, sabre teeth and the great guanaco.

The archaeological remains are also of importance. The site is an early habitation site of Selk'nam tribes. They enjoyed abundant wildlife for hunting and also exploited estuarine resources of the Seno Ultima Esperanza inlet.

This site not only has interesting human and animal remains, it also has an interesting geology. The rocks are limestone rich conglomerates, which are not really prone to the formation of karst, but it actually happens. But in this case the huge caves were formed by a completely different process. 18,000 BP the area was covered by a glacier, but Cerro Benítez (Benitez Hill) was higher than the ice shield. The slow movement of the ice was eroding on the sides of the hill making it steeper. In other words, the escarpments with the shelters is basically a result of the glacier eroding the hill. But around 14,500 BP the last cold age slowly came to an end and the glacier retreated, the melting water formed a huge lake named Gran Lago and Benítez Hill became an island. The wind created waves on the lake, which eroded the softer layers of shale and sandstone in the hill which were at the same level as the surface of the lake. So the formation of caves happened not all around the island, it happened only where the main direction of the wind and the softer rocks came together. The softer rocks were removed almost completely and the walls of the cave are now the harder and more resistant conglomerate. Around 13,500 BP the lake level dropped, obviously some outflow opened, and the island became accessible for the megafauna, so there were no older remains inside the cave.

There are other nice geologic sites in the area, for example La Silla del Diablo (The Devil's Chair) which is a tower of conglomerate which was eroded in this form by the water of the lake. It is located at the entrance to the Cueva del Milodon Natural Monument.

During the last years the infrastructure at the Natural Monument was improved, the entrance fees improved also though. There are an Environmental Information Center, hygienic services, snack areas in different sectors of the unit, trails and sale of souvenirs and food. There is now even a trail which was designed for people who have some degree of disability or have reduced mobility. Its name is Cueva Grande Trail. The site is managed by the CONAF, the Corporatión National Forestal (National Forest Service). The site now requires prebooking, there is an official portal for the sale of passes to national parks and reserves.