An ancient and powerful tusked animal was exhumed from the mud of a stream bed in Iowa.
Enthusiasts from the local community and archaeologists from the University of Iowa took 12 days to carefully excavate several skull bones after a local resident reported the remains of an oversized leg on private property to the State Archaeologist’s Office in 2022.
The 13,600-year-old fossil remains belong to a mastodon (Mammoth sp.), a long-extinct, distant relative of today’s elephants.
“This is the first well-preserved mastodon (especially the skull) excavated in Iowa,” the archaeologists explain in a Facebook post.
The discovery of a young mastodon tooth suggests that there may be more remains in the area. Among the artifacts found were stone tools that were dated to within a few thousand years of the mastodon’s death.
The archaeologists hope that a detailed analysis of their finds could provide further clues about the early relationship between the two species.
“We’re really hoping to find evidence of human interaction with this creature – perhaps the projectile points and knives that were used to kill the animal and initially dismember it,” says state archaeologist John Doershuk. “There’s also potential evidence on the bones themselves – there could be identifiable cutting marks there.”
Mastodons were about the same size as modern elephants, but were probably more massive; their weight has been estimated at up to 6,000 kg (6 tons).
Like other megafauna, including the giant sloths of South America and the megawombats of Australia, they slowly disappeared from the landscape shortly after humans arrived in North America about 14,000 years ago.
The last known mastodon was recovered from peat near Pleasant Lake in Michigan. It is dated to be nearly 10,500 years old and shows signs of slaughter and hunting.
Although the exact cause of their extinction is unknown, researchers suspect that a combination of human activity and climate change may have played a decisive role. A tuberculosis pandemic may also have played a role.
Both mammoths and mastodons roamed North America for millions of years until the last ice age. However, mammoths arrived on the continent much later, whereas mastodons are believed to be native to the Americas.
Despite their similar appearance, they last had a common ancestor about 20 million years ago.
Unlike their larger, distant relatives, mastodons were forest dwellers. Their teeth were designed to grind tougher trees and shrubs rather than cut up herbs and grasses like the plains-dwelling mammoths.
During warmer climate periods, mastodons reached as far as Alaska. Today we are seeing the distribution of modern animal species such as moose and beavers expand northwards in a similar way.
In total, the archaeological team found 20 different pieces that they believe are the remains of the same animal, including fragments of a rib, its spine, another leg bone and a kneecap. Analysis of its tusk should reveal further biological details of the giant mammal, such as its age, sex and diet.
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“I never thought in a million years I would ever have the experience of digging up a mastodon skull,” Dan Clark wrote in a Facebook comment. “I can’t wait to see the final product when it’s fully cleaned and restored.”
Once the university completes its analysis, the bones will be displayed at the Prairie Trails Museum.
