Miners find nearly perfectly preserved woolly rhino from 10,000 years ago as experts hope to bring animal ‘back to life’
MINERS have found a nearly perfectly preserved woolly rhino which experts hope to bring back to life.
The magnificent 10,000 year old beast was stumbled upon by gobsmacked workers who were digging for gold.
The exceptional find was in the Gulag prison camp region of Kolyma in eastern Russia.
Scientists will now examine the rhino which was mummified by permafrost.
There are hopes of bringing such extinct animals – including woolly mammoths – back to live by using DNA found on such carcasses preserved in the ice.
Pictures show the discovery including the horn still intact after preservation in the ice.
Woolly rhinos were largely extinct some 10,000 years ago with the end of the last Ice Age.
Climate change and possibly human hunting may have added to the demise of the species.
Gold miners finding the latest discovery were “surprised and delighted” by their unexpected treasure.
It comes as archaeologists recently discovered three new species of ancient giant kangaroo.
The fossils were found in Australia and New Guinea, and they suggest the species was much more diverse than previously thought.
The three newly discovered species belong to a now-extinct group called Protemnodon.
These creatures lived around 5 million to 40,000 years ago.
The largest was about double the size of the modern kangaroos.
Lead researcher Dr. Isaac Kerr and a team focussed on three fossils for the study.
The complete fossils were found in 2013, 2018, and 2019 and all belong to the genus Protemnodon.
Woolly rhino
The woolly rhinoceros had a very large, thick body with four short, stocky legs. Its shaggy fur and thick body helped it survive in cold climates.
It also had two huge horns on its snout and was related to to today’s rhinoceros.
After the most recent ice age ended about 11,700 years ago, the woolly rhino became extinct.
It measured about 12 feet (4 meters) long and 6 feet (2 meters) tall.
The front horn on the beasts head was larger. It measured nearly 3 feet (1 meter).
The woolly rhino mainly ate a diet of grass, plants, trees and mosses and lived alone or in small family groups.
A new study about the fossils has been published in the journal Megataxa.
The biggest ancient kangaroo mentioned in the study is called Protemnodon viator.
It was much bigger and weighed up to 375 pounds, twice as much as a male red kangaroo.