Ice Age Animals and Their Desendants

Scientists have long studied Ice Age animals due to fossil records or frozen remains preserved in permafrost, providing insights into why some went extinct and others remain alive today. Scientists use these remains as clues to understanding what caused their demise.

Edward Drinker Cope was an 18th-century paleontologist who observed that fossil species found in lower layers were typically smaller than those found higher up the rock strata – this principle later became known as Cope’s Rule.

Mastodon

The Mastodon was an ancient Ice Age animal similar to Woolly Mammoths but with larger tusks and no tail. Fossils of this animal have been discovered across North America and are distinguished from them by having cone-shaped molars which made chewing vegetation easier – their main food source.

These animals traveled widely, following seasonal migration patterns linked to mating behavior and detected through isotopic analysis of tusks. Strontium signatures found in local bedrock become fixed into plants that then get eaten by herbivores – so tracking an animal by tracking what strontium it left behind can be like following its footsteps.

Radiocarbon dating of mastodon fossils found in Alaska and Yukon provides answers to when these extinct relatives of modern elephants lived there, suggesting they only inhabited Arctic and subarctic environments during warm periods.

Dire Wolf

The dire wolf was an imposing predator during the Ice Age, hunting large herbivores. Relatives to modern Canis lupus species, this Canis lupus species was significantly larger.

Rancho La Brea tar pits have yielded thousands of fossilized remains from extinct canids that have long since gone extinct, and some even made an appearance in Game of Thrones on HBO. Now, however, an innovative genetic analysis study of these ancient canines is giving paleontologists cause for alarm.

An Ice Age dire wolf tooth discovered by a University of Nevada Las Vegas researcher near Lake Mead is being considered the first fossil to ever have been unearthed in Nevada and is set to rewrite the history of these canid species.

Camel

Woolly mammoths, bison, and horses are commonly seen at Ice Age fossil sites; however, camel bones have been more scarce. So when Palaeontologist Grant Zazula picked up some odd-looking skull pieces during goldmine digs in Yukon, he sent them off to Dr. Heintzman at UCSC’s Paleogenomics lab for study.

Heintzman used ancient DNA preserved within fossils to reconstruct the camel family tree and his findings dramatically shifted how scientists thought ice age western camels (Camelops hesternus) fitted into this picture; fossil data placed them on an irrelevant branch that ultimately led to today’s dromidary and Bactrian camels found in desert regions; but DNA evidence now suggests they split off about 10 million years ago from modern-day camels.

Beaver

Beavers have long been an iconic species in North America. Famous for building dams and wetlands, beavers also face many predators including black bears, coyotes, lynx, and bobcats as well as flooding and disease threats.

Beavers can alter their environment by building dams, earning them a reputation as ecosystem engineers. Beavers are widespread throughout North America. During the Ice Age, however, beavers were much larger; during the Pleistocene period, fossil evidence suggests giant beaver species (Castoroides), being around the size of a black bear at times, flourished from Florida to Alaska and Yukon (including Florida! ). Their diet consisted almost solely of aquatic plants which meant it depended heavily on wetlands which began disappearing towards the end of the Ice Age; Western University scientists suggest this may have contributed to this animal’s eventual extinction.

Sloth

Ice age animals don’t get any more iconic than the sloth. No longer simply slow tree dwellers, these Pleistocene herbivores could grow as large as bears and elephants during Pleistocene times. One species called Jefferson ground sloth (Megalonyx jeffersonii) even weighed nearly three tons! Featuring scaley skin and enormous claws to defend itself against predators and dermal ossicles–little nodules of bone in its skin that looked like armor–protecting it even further from predators!

Sid was created based on modern three-toed sloths as well as extinct ground sloths (Megalonyxs). He is seen both being comical and dim-witted while caring and protective of his animal companions, often climbing trees for shelter while jumping into rivers for refreshing swimming sessions.