Mammoth

For other uses, see Mammoth (disambiguation).

Unikonta

Mammoth Temporal range: Early Pliocene to Middle Holocene
Columbian mammoth in the George C. Page Museum, Los Angeles
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Mammalia
Order:	Proboscidea
Family:	Elephantidae
Genus:	†Mammuthus Brookes, 1828
Type species
†Mammuthus primigenius (Blumenbach, 1799 [originally Elephas])
Species
†M. subplanifrons African mammoth †M. africanavus North African mammoth †M. meridionalis Southern mammoth †M. sungari Songhua River Mammoth †M. trogontherii Steppe Mammoth †M. imperator Imperial mammoth †M. columbi Columbian mammoth †M. exilis Pygmy mammoth †M. primigenius Woolly mammoth †M. lamarmorae Sardinian dwarf mammoth †Mammuthus hayi

A mammoth is any species of the extinct genus Mammuthus, proboscideans commonly equipped with long, curved tusks and, in northern species, a covering of long hair. They lived from the Pliocene epoch from around 5 million years ago, into the Holocene at about 4,500 years ago. and were members of the family Elephantidae, which contains, along with mammoths, the two genera of modern elephants and their ancestors.

Etymology

The word "mammoth" comes from the Russian мамонт mamont, probably in turn from the Vogul (Mansi) language, mang ont, meaning "earth horn". The word first appeared in English in Richard James's Dictionariolum Russico-Anglicum of 1618. In English, the noun "mammoth" also has become an adjective meaning "large" or "massive".

Description

Like their modern relatives, mammoths were quite large. The largest known species reached heights in the region of 4 m (13 ft) at the shoulder and weights up to 8 tonnes (9 short tons), while exceptionally large males may have exceeded 12 tonnes (13 short tons). However, most species of mammoth were only about as large as a modern Asian elephant. Based on studies of their close relatives, the modern elephants, mammoths probably had a gestation period of 22 months, resulting in a single calf being born. Their social structure was probably the same as that of African and Asian elephants, with females living in herds headed by a matriarch, whilst bulls lived solitary lives or formed loose groups after sexual maturity.

Extinction

Full-size reconstruction of a woolly mammoth at the Royal BC Museum, Victoria, British Columbia

The woolly mammoth was the last species of the genus. Most populations of the woolly mammoth in North America and Eurasia, as well all the Columbian mammoths in North America, died out around the time of the last glacial retreat, as part of a mass extinction of megafauna in northern Eurasia and the Americas. Until recently, the last woolly mammoths were generally assumed to have vanished from Europe and southern Siberia about 12000 years ago, but new findings show some were still present there about 10,000 years ago. Slightly later, the woolly mammoths also disappeared from continental northern Siberia. A small population survived on St. Paul Island, Alaska, up until 3750 BCE, and the small mammoths of Wrangel Island survived until 1650 BCE. Recent research of sediments in Alaska indicates mammoths survived on the American mainland until 10,000 years ago.

A definitive explanation for their mass extinction has yet to be agreed upon. The warming trend (Holocene) that occurred 12,000 years ago, accompanied by a glacial retreat and rising sea levels, has been suggested as a contributing factor. Forests replaced open woodlands and grasslands across the continent. The available habitat may have been reduced for some megafaunal species, such as the mammoth. However, such climate changes were nothing new; numerous very similar warming episodes had occurred previously within the ice age of the last several million years without producing comparable megafaunal extinctions, so climate alone is unlikely to have played a decisive role. The spread of advanced human hunters through northern Eurasia and the Americas around the time of the extinctions was a new development, and thus might have contributed significantly.

Whether the general mammoth population died out for climatic reasons or due to overhunting by humans is controversial. Another theory suggests mammoths may have fallen victim to an infectious disease. A combination of climate change and hunting by humans may be a possible explanation for their extinction. Homo erectus is known to have consumed mammoth meat as early as 1.8 million years ago. A site in Ukraine suggests Neanderthals built dwellings using mammoth bones.

However, the American Institute of Biological Sciences also notes bones of dead elephants, left on the ground and subsequently trampled by other elephants, tend to bear marks resembling butchery marks, which have previously been misinterpreted as such by archaeologists.^{[citation needed]}

Dwarfing occurred with the pygmy mammoth on the outer Channel Islands of California, but at an earlier period. Those animals were very likely killed by early Paleo-Native Americans, and habitat loss caused by a rising sea level that split Santa Rosae into the outer Channel Islands.^{[citation needed]}

See also

• Ivory trade
• La Brea tar pits
• Mastodon
• Pleistocene Park
• Mammuthus primigenius

Further reading

• Bahn, Paul G.; Lister, Adrian (1994). Mammoths. New York: Macmillan USA. ISBN 0-02-572985-3. 
• Capelli, C.; MacPhee, R. D. E.; Roca, A. L.; Brisighelli, F.; Georgiadis, N.; o’Brien, S. J.; Greenwood, A. D. (2006). "A nuclear DNA phylogeny of the woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius)". Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 40 (2): 620–627. doi:10.1016/j.ympev.2006.03.015. PMID 16631387. 
• Conniff R (2010). "Mammoths and Mastodons: All American Monsters". Smithsonian Magazine. http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/Mammoths-and-Mastodons-All-American-Monsters.html. Retrieved 2012-03-07. 
• "Mammoth genome cracked: key to cloning". COSMOS magazine. 2008. http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/news/2346/mammoth-genome-cracked-key-cloning. Retrieved 2012-03-07. 
• "National Park Service Findings 'Good News' For Waco Mammoth Site". Baylor University. http://www.baylor.edu/pr/news.php?action=story&story=44819. Retrieved 2012-03-07. 
• Hayes J (2006). "Back from the dead". COSMOS magazine. http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/903. Retrieved 2012-03-07. 
• Keddie G. "The Mammoth Story" (pdf). Royal BC Museum. http://www.royalbcmuseum.bc.ca/Content_Files/Files/mammoth-1.pdf+. Retrieved 2012-03-07. 
• Levy, S. (2006). "Clashing with Titans". BioScience 56 (4): 292–292. doi:10.1641/0006-3568(2006)56[292:CWT]2.0.CO;2. 
• Martin, Paul (2005). Twilight of the mammoths: ice age extinctions and the rewilding of America. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-23141-4. 
• Mercer, Henry Chapman (2010). The Lenape Stone: Or The Indian And The Mammoth (1885). Kessinger Publishing, LLC. ISBN 1-163-88558-4. 
• Rodgers J (2006). "Mammoth skeleton found in Siberia". BBC News. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/5008664.stm+. Retrieved 2012-03-07. 
• Stone, Richard G. (2003). Mammoth: The Resurrection of an Ice Age Giant. Fourth Estate Ltd. ISBN 1-84115-518-7.