CHEYENNE — North American lions, cheetahs and short-faced bears: Those are just a few fearsome critters from 25,000 years ago that paleontologists already might have found in their first excavation of a bizarre cave in 30 years.

“They’re very excited about the potential for what they’ve found,” Brent Breit-haupt, who was among the exclusive group of scientists who recently rappelled down eight stories to excavate the floor of Natural Trap Cave, said Wednesday.

The only way in or out of Natural Trap Cave is a 15-foot-wide hole in the ground that’s almost impossible to see until you’re next to it. Over tens of thousands of years, several thousand insufficiently wary animals plummeted more than 80 feet into the chilly, dim, cathedral-like cavern.

Over the past two weeks, bucket after bucket, by rope and pulley, some 10 to 20 paleontologists, their assistants and a few spelunking experts have been hauling bones and bone-bearing sediment up into the sunlight.