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Description

The woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius). A classic prehistoric mammal. There were actually several species of Mammoth with the Woolly being the last arrival on the scene. It appears to have diverged from the Steppe Mammoth of Eurasia about 400,000 years ago with the modern Indian (Asian) elephant being its closest living relative. The branch of African elephants (Loxodonta) diverged about 6 million years ago from the main elephantidae family.

The Woolly Mammoth appears to have evolved to fill an empty niche during the colder glacial periods of the ice age. Interestingly they are a recent development despite the earliest elephant relatives going back further than the ice age that started 2.5 million years ago. They are the last in line for the mammoth species with the most recent having gone extinct about 6,000 and 4,000 years ago, though most died out with the rest of the megafauna of the Pleistocene about 11,500 years ago.

Despite books and movies imagining them as super huge, they were actually about the same size as modern African elephants with the males averaging 10-11 tall at the shoulder and being larger than the females. They were covered in fur with an outercoat of long fur and an undercoat of short fur. There coloring varied from light tans or browns to very dark to dark reddish brown. Their signature long and curved tusks were probably used for display as well or mostly for scraping away snow to get at the tough tundra grasses that their teeth were designed to chew.

Woollies wandered into North America about 300,000 years ago, likely across the Bering Landbridge, when ocean levels were low during a glacial period. They inhabited the northern lattitudes while the larger Columbian Mammoth inhabited warmer lower latitudes. It seems both may have intermingled and interbred creating a subspecies. By 40,000 years ago they replaced earlier Asian descended species.

Humans in Asia, Eurasia, Europe and North America all had interactions with Woollies and quite possibly helped to bring them to extinction. Before modern humans had come along most megafauna survived the transitions of warming periods and glacial periods without going extinct, but a reduction in resources and humans spreading and occupying so many environments may have reduced populations beyond recovery. And in today's environment, it is unlikely Woollies would have enough space to live even if they had survived. They would be confined to the regions around the Arctic Circle and even that is limited by human incursion.

Description

The woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius). A classic prehistoric mammal. There were actually several species of Mammoth with the Woolly being the last arrival on the scene. It appears to have diverged from the Steppe Mammoth of Eurasia about 400,000 years ago with the modern Indian (Asian) elephant being its closest living relative. The branch of African elephants (Loxodonta) diverged about 6 million years ago from the main elephantidae family.

The Woolly Mammoth appears to have evolved to fill an empty niche during the colder glacial periods of the ice age. Interestingly they are a recent development despite the earliest elephant relatives going back further than the ice age that started 2.5 million years ago. They are the last in line for the mammoth species with the most recent having gone extinct about 6,000 and 4,000 years ago, though most died out with the rest of the megafauna of the Pleistocene about 11,500 years ago.

Despite books and movies imagining them as super huge, they were actually about the same size as modern African elephants with the males averaging 10-11 tall at the shoulder and being larger than the females. They were covered in fur with an outercoat of long fur and an undercoat of short fur. There coloring varied from light tans or browns to very dark to dark reddish brown. Their signature long and curved tusks were probably used for display as well or mostly for scraping away snow to get at the tough tundra grasses that their teeth were designed to chew.

Woollies wandered into North America about 300,000 years ago, likely across the Bering Landbridge, when ocean levels were low during a glacial period. They inhabited the northern lattitudes while the larger Columbian Mammoth inhabited warmer lower latitudes. It seems both may have intermingled and interbred creating a subspecies. By 40,000 years ago they replaced earlier Asian descended species.

Humans in Asia, Eurasia, Europe and North America all had interactions with Woollies and quite possibly helped to bring them to extinction. Before modern humans had come along most megafauna survived the transitions of warming periods and glacial periods without going extinct, but a reduction in resources and humans spreading and occupying so many environments may have reduced populations beyond recovery. And in today's environment, it is unlikely Woollies would have enough space to live even if they had survived. They would be confined to the regions around the Arctic Circle and even that is limited by human incursion.