“Unearthed from the Past: Iowa Teen’s Incredible Discovery of a 34,000-Year-Old Mastodon Jaw on a Friend’s Farm”
Imagine rummaging through the underbrush, looking for old arrowheads, only to stumble upon a massive jawbone from a creature that roamed the Earth 34,000 years ago. Talk about a surprise! A teenager in Iowa experienced just that, finding the remains of a mastodon, an elephant-like giant that went extinct a mere 10,000 years ago. How does such an extraordinary fossil land in the hands of a starry-eyed teen? With careful timing and a little splash of luck, the discovery might have been different if it hadn’t been found when it was; left in the sun, this ancient marvel could have turned to dust. Join me on this wild journey into the past as we explore the significance of this find and what it tells us about the prehistoric world. LEARN MORE.
If the prehistoric mastodon fossil hadn’t been found when it was, it might have dried out and crumbled.
A teenager went looking for arrowheads on a friend’s farm in Iowa. Instead, he found the bones of a 34,000-year-old mastodon — an elephant cousin that went extinct 10,000 years ago.
According to the Iowa City Press-Citizen, the jaw bone, which measures 30 inches long, belonged to a juvenile mastodon — an elephant-like animal believed to have roamed Iowa tens of thousands of years ago.
Researchers at the University of Iowa’s Paleontology Repository, where the bones are now being stored, believe that the bone belonged to a young mastodon that likely stood around 7 feet tall. The prehistoric remains have been tucked away in the cabinets of the university’s Trowbridge Hall.
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