Mammoth skeleton at Hot Springs, South Dakota

Credit: PETER MENZEL/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY

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Caption: Mammoth skeleton. View of a mounted Mammuthus columbi skeleton. Its giant upcurved tusks are at upper left. This reproduction copy of a Columbian mammoth stands in the lobby of the Hot Springs Mammoth Site in South Dakota, USA. Hot Springs is the site of the largest collection of Columbian mammoth fossils in the Western Hemisphere. The fossilised skeletons of at least 43 mammoths lie here, buried for 26,000 years. Mammuthus columbi was a giant elephant-like mammal, some 4 metres in height, which roamed temperate parts of North America. It was an important later relative of the woolly mammoth of Europe and Siberia. This fossil site was discovered in 1974.

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Keywords: animal, animals, columbian, fossil mammoth, hot spring, mammoth, mammoth site, mammoths, mammuthus columbi, palaeontology, paleontology, skeleton

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