It’s Christmas early for paleontologists as a man discovered a fossilized mastodon jaw while gardening at his upstate New York home.
The mastodon jaw and other bone fragments were found in late September in a backyard near Scotchtown, a hamlet about 70 miles (112 kilometers) northwest of New York City, museum officials said. New York State.
The backyard owner did not want to be identified, said Robert Feranec, the state museum’s director of research and collections and curator of Ice Age animals.
The individual noticed what he initially thought were baseballs, Mr. Feranec said Wednesday. “He picked them up and realized they were teeth,” he said.
Excavations by staff at the museum and the Orange County campus of the State University of New York uncovered a complete, well-preserved jaw of an adult mastodon as well as a piece of bone from toe and a rib fragment, museum officials reported.
“While the jaw is the star discovery, the additional toe and rib fragments provide valuable context and the potential for additional research,” said Cory Harris, chair of SUNY Orange’s Department of Behavioral Sciences. “We also hope to further explore the immediate area to see if there are any additional bones that have been preserved.”
Officials at the Albany-based state museum said the jaw was the first complete mastodon jaw found in New York in 11 years. They noted that more than 150 fossils of this extinct relative of the elephant have been found across the state to date, about a third of them in Orange County – the same area as the recent discovery.
Mr Feranec said the newly discovered jawbone provides “a unique opportunity to study the ecology of this magnificent species, which will improve our understanding of the Ice Age ecosystems of this region.”
The fossils will be carbon dated and analyzed to determine the mastodon’s age, diet and habitat during its life and will go on public display in 2025, museum officials said.
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