Wookey Hole Caves to 1874 by William Boyd Dawkins, who moved to Somerset to study classics with the vicar of Wookey. On hearing of the discovery of bones by local workmen he led excavations in the area of the hyena den. His work led to the discovery of the first evidence for the use by Palaeolithic man in the Caves of the Mendip Hills. Middle Paleolithic tools have been found in association with butchered bones with a radiocarbon age of around 41,000 years. Herbert E. Balch continued the work from 1904 to 1914, when he led excavations of the entrance passage (1904–1915), Witch's
Cheddar Complex calcareous dry dwarf-shrub heath, semi-natural broadleaved woodland and dense and scattered scrub. Four nationally rare plants are present, including Little Robin "Geranium purpureum", Cheddar Pink "Dianthus gratianopolitanus" and Cheddar Bedstraw "Galium fleurotii", two of which are endemic to the Cheddar area, as well as fifteen nationally scarce species. This site is important for karst, caves and vertebrate palaeontology and comprises four single interest localities. Cheddar Gorge is Britain’s largest gorge and probably the country’s best known limestone feature. It is a spectacular fluvial feature with a geomorphic history extending back 2 million years and encompassing the major environmental changes of