Alaska: most recent mammoths discovered

This 2016 video is called What Really Killed Off the Woolly Mammoth?

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Alaska: most recent mammoths discovered Linking: 4 Comments: 6

Date: 10/21/05 at 10:19PM

Mood: Looking Playing: Nellie the elephant

Published online: 20 October 2005

Mammoth cave yields most recent animals

Alaskan island proves stronghold for mammoths in North America

Alexandra Witze

Archaeologists have unearthed the most recent remains of a mammoth yet discovered in North America.

The bones, found in a cave on Alaska’s remote Pribilof Islands, may represent the last bastion of the giant animals, or megafauna, that once freely roamed the continent.

The discovery underscores the fact that megafaunal species often seem to have made their last stand on isolated islands, sheltered from the danger of hunting.

Some say the fact that such animals survived longer when beyond the reach of humans is proof that mankind was a big factor in driving the beasts to extinction.

The bones date to around 5,700 radiocarbon years ago – at least 2,200 years younger than any other known North American mammoth, says Kristine Crossen, a geologist at the University of Alaska in Anchorage. …

Mammoths died out on mainland Alaska around 11,500 radiocarbon years ago, the end of the Pleistocene epoch.

But they are known to have lived longer elsewhere.

Last year, other mammoth remains on St Paul Island were reported to be 7,900 radiocarbon years old.

And on Wrangel Island, off Siberia, their remains have been found dating as recently as 3,700 years ago.

Most of these island mammoths, including the St Paul animals, were smaller than normal – just 10% of the normal size range for a mammoth, says Crossen.

The animals may have shrunk in size as the island itself shrank, losing ground as sea levels rose after the end of the last ice age.

Source: here.

Last woolly mammoths on Earth ‘killed off by lack of water’. The last population of mammoths on St Paul island in Alaska became extinct around 5,600 years ago: here.

Columbian mammoths: here.