Page 5 - Woolly Mammoth

what is a woolly mammoth? mammoth facts

MAMMUTHUS is the scientific name for all mammoths

dult woolly mammoths
The woolly mammoth lived around 200,000 to 4,000 years ago, during the Ahad to eat 500 pounds (226 kg)

Pleistocene and Holocene periods. Fossils and mummies of its skeleton have of food each day. Their molars had

been found in North America, Northern Europe, and Asia (see page 22). hardened ridges to grind down

tough plant stalks and bark. They
It had big teeth—four molars and two Its tusks were used to
tusks. The tusks curved inward to help clear away snow from the grew new molars six times

balance their weight. ground to feed, to rub bark from oolly mammoths lived throughout their lives. By cutting a
trees, and to fend off predators.
Wduring the last two ice ages. section through a tusk, scientists

It stored a They were similar to Asian can age mammoths by counting
hump of fat on its elephants, but they had adapted to growth rings. The oldest ones lived
It used
shoulders to help it the cold. They were covered with to be 60.
its tusks
survive the lean
in fights with brown fur and were bulked out with
winters.
rival males. fat. Both sexes of mammoths

evolved long tusks to help them

cope with their frozen world and a mammoth

It had with the large predators that molar
two “fingertips” at the hunted them. Unlike modern-day ike elephants today, it
end of its trunk that could elephants, they had small ears and Lis believed that mammoths

pluck grass and plants.
short tails to minimize heat loss formed social herds of females, led
and frostbite. The shape of their by an older matriarch. The females

MAMMUTHUS PRIMIGENIUS
trunk tips enabled them to pluck up would be sought out by lone males
(FIRST MAMMOTH) the plants that grew on the steppe. during breeding season.

MEASURED UP TO 11 FEET

(3.4 M) HIGH AND WEIGHED

6 TONS (5,443 KG). THE
Its outer fur was 3 feet (1 m)
LARGEST TUSKS WERE
long. Under that was a shorter
14 FEET (4.3 M) LONG.
coat, and beneath its skin, there
was a 4-inch (10-cm) layer of fat.

This would be a woolly mammoth and you.

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