Castlepook’s disturbed bone archive complicates any simple picture of Ice-Age Ireland. The mixture of mammoth, reindeer, hyaena and smaller cold-adapted animals suggests recurring connections with north-west Europe and varied open habitats, yet the deposits cannot show that all these species lived together or at one moment. This uncertainty makes the possible butchered reindeer femur especially intriguing: it may record a fleeting human visit, while lacking the context needed to establish occupation. How should researchers combine improved dating, cave taphonomy, glacial reconstruction and comparisons with neighbouring regions to distinguish short-lived animal and human movements from longer-term patterns of habitation and connectivity?