The NPS framing of this question is deliberately open: “Why do you think they stopped coming into the cave?” — an invitation to consider the question rather than a statement of an established answer.

The honest archaeological response is that the cessation of mining is documented, that it happened around 200 BCE, and that the specific causes remain uncertain.

What is clear is that the cessation was essentially complete.

There is no evidence of sustained Indigenous mining in Mammoth Cave after 200 BCE.

There is some evidence of later Indigenous use of the cave’s entrance areas — but the deep penetration, the miles-in exploration, the systematic mineral collection — all of that stopped and did not resume.

The cave that the ancient miners had known as a working environment, a place of labor and possibly of sacred meaning, became a place where their traces survived perfectly but their presence did not.