Home · Science · Sep 16 archive
Rare Fossil Tooth Unveiled in California Creek
Confirmed
In Short: A massive fossilized tooth discovered in a California preserve is giving scientists a rare glimpse into the Ice Age and the prehistoric creatures that once roamed the San Francisco Bay Area.
A massive fossilized tooth, estimated to be from a Pacific mastodon, has been discovered in a California preserve, offering scientists a rare glimpse into the Ice Age and the prehistoric creatures that once roamed the region, according to FOX Weather.
The tooth, about 8.5 inches long, 3 inches wide, and 7 inches deep, was found by geomorphologist Brigid Lynch while surveying rocks as part of a project to improve habitat for the threatened California red-legged frog, FOX Weather reported.
The find is significant, as it provides insight into the biodiversity of the area during the Ice Age, with Christine Garcia, curator and manager of the Geoscience Specimen Collection at Stanford, explaining, 'Fossils are our only opportunity to see into past biodiversity.
The tooth's discovery also highlights the potential for unexpected finds in the region, where common wildlife such as mountain lions and bobcats currently hunt for prey, but whose ancestors may have hunted alongside now-extinct animals like dire wolves or saber-tooth cats.
What's confirmed
- “The tooth itself is in immaculate condition. It's the most complete mastodon molar from our area, and the most spectacular mastodon molar that I've ever seen. I had chills and shivers up and down my spine,” Wayne Thompson, a paleontologist and owner of Pacific Paleontology, said in the press release.
- “Fossils are our only opportunity to see into past biodiversity,” explained Christine Garcia, curator and manager of the Geoscience Specimen Collection at Stanford, in the press release.
What's still developing
- Emily Buttress said the Essex Wildlife Trust was not necessarily against development, but they wanted it to be sustainable Plans to build a new data centre could threaten the habitat of one of Britain's most endangered plants and a rare species of bumblebee, a wildlife trust said.
- It is home to the rare broad-leaved cudweed and shrill carder bumblebee and the Essex Wildlife Trust fears "incredibly rare" habitats would be "destroyed".
- Read More : Early Americans Got Nearly 98 Percent of Their Calories From Mammoths and Other Large Mammals According to ABC, the tooth is about 8.5 inches long, 3 inches wide, and about 7 inches deep.
- Learn more about a fossilized mastodon tooth that was originally mistaken for an oddly shaped rock.
- "I was down in the creek bed surveying rocks when I came across it and thought — that one is very weirdly shaped," Lynch said.
- An editorially independent publication supported by the Simons Foundation.