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Information about Mastodont

This article is about the prehistoric elephant-like animal. For the heavy metal band, see Mastodon (band). For other uses, see Mastodon (disambiguation).
Mastodon
Enlarge picture
Mastodon angustidens

Mastodon angustidens
Conservation status
Prehistoric
Scientific classification
Kingdom:Animalia
Phylum:Chordata
Class:Mammalia
Order:Proboscidea
Family:Mammutidae
Hay, 1922
Genus:Mammut
Mastodons or Mastodonts (meaning "nipple-teeth") are members of the extinct genus Mammut of the order Proboscidea and form the family Mammutidae; they resembled, but were distinct from, the woolly mammoth which belongs to the family Elephantidae. Mastodons were browsers and mammoths were grazers.

Habitat

Mastodons are thought to have first appeared almost four million years ago. They were native to both Eurasia and North America, but died out in Eurasia approximately three million years ago. They disappeared from North America about 10,000 years ago,[1] at the same time as most other Pleistocene megafauna.

Though their habitat spanned a large territory, mastodons were most common in the Ice age spruce forests of the eastern United States, as well as in warmer lowland environments.[2] Their remains have been found as far as 300 kilometers offshore in the northeastern United States, in areas that were dry land during the low sea level stand of the last ice age.[3] Mastodon fossils have been found in South America, on the Olympic Peninsula of Washington state, USA,[4] in Kentucky (particularly noteworthy are early finds in what is now Big Bone Lick State Park), in Stewiack, Nova Scotia, Canada, and north of Fort Wayne, Indiana, USA.

Description

While mastodons were furry like woolly mammoths, and similar in height at roughly three meters at the shoulder, the resemblance was superficial. They differed from mammoths primarily in the blunt, conical shape of their teeth [5], which were more suited to chewing leaves than the high-crowned teeth mammoths used for grazing; the name mastodon (or mastodont) means mastoid teeth (Greek μαστός and οδούς "nipple tooth"), and is also an obsolete name for their genus. Their skulls were larger and flatter than those of mammoths, while their skeleton was stockier and more robust.[6] Mastodons also seem to have lacked the undercoat characteristic of mammoths.[6]

The tusks of the mastodon sometimes exceeded five meters in length, and were nearly horizontal, in contrast with the more curved mammoth tusks.[6] Young males had vestigial lower tusks that were lost in adulthood.[6] However it has been proven that female mastodons had lower pairs of tusks. The tusks were probably used to break branches and twigs although some evidence suggests males may have used them in mating challenges; one tusk is often shorter than the other, suggesting that, like humans, mastodons may have had laterality.[6] Examination of fossilized tusks revealed a series of regularly spaced shallow pits on the underside of the tusks. Microscopic examination showed damage to the dentin under the pits. It is theorized that the damage was caused when the males were fighting over mating rights. The curved shape of the tusks would have forced them downward with each blow, causing damage to the newly forming ivory at the base of the tusk. The regularity of the damage in the growth patterns of the tusks indicates that this was an annual occurrence, probably occurring during the spring and early summer.[7]

Extinction

The meat of mastodons was a food source for early humans. Paleontologists are still trying to determine what role, if any, the early human settlers of North America played in the extinction of the mastodon.

Recent studies by scientists in Ohio and New York concluded that tuberculosis may have been partly responsible for the extinction of the Mastodon 10,000 years ago.[8][9]

In September 2007, Mark Holley, an underwater archeologist with the Grand Traverse Bay Underwater Preserve Council who teaches at Northwestern Michigan College in Traverse City, Michigan, said that they might have discovered a boulder (3.5 to 4 feet high x 5 feet long) with a prehistoric carving in the Grand Traverse Bay of Lake Michigan. The granite rock has markings that resemble a mastodon with a spear in its side. Confirmation that the markings are an ancient petroglyph will require more evidence.[10]

Museums

The following museums and colleges have mastodon fossils on display:

Current excavations

Current excavations are going on annually at the Hiscock site in Byron, NY for mastodon and related paleo-Indian artifacts. The site was discovered in 1959 by the Hiscock family while digging a pond with a backhoe; they found a large tusk and stopped digging. The Buffalo Museum of Science has organized the dig since 1983. It has been called one of the richest sites available for mastodon-related artifacts. The site sits on swampland that was covered by Lake Tonowanda, which was a glacier runoff lake formed over 10,000 years ago. It has been confirmed that mastodons would flock there to eat the sodium-rich clay during one of the last great droughts of the paleolithic.

See also

Island 35 Mastodon

References

Enlarge picture
The Exhumation of the Mastodon by Peale
1. ^ "Greek mastodon find 'spectacular'", BBC News, 24 July 2007. Retrieved on 2007-07-24. 
2. ^ Björn Kurtén and Elaine Anderson, Pleistocene Mammals of North America, (New York: Columbia UP, 1980), p. 344.
3. ^ Kurtén and Anderson, p. 344.
4. ^ Kirk and Daugherty, Archaeology in Washington, forthcoming from University of Washington Press, April 2007.
5. ^ [1]
6. ^ Kurtén and Anderson, p. 345
7. ^ Fisher, D (Oct. 18-21, 2006). "Tusk cementum defects record musth battles in American mastodons". Sixty-Sixth Annual Meeting of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology. 
8. ^ [2]
9. ^ [3]
10. ^ Flesher, John. "Possible mastodon carving found on rock", Associated Press, 2007-09-04. Retrieved on 2007-09-05. 

External links

Mastodon is a Grammy-nominated[1] band from Atlanta, Georgia. They are usually classified as a heavy metal group, but there have been debates on what specific sub-genre they belong to.
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Mastodon is a large, elephant-like, extinct mammal.

Mastodon may also refer to:
  • Mastodon (band), an American heavy metal band
  • Mastodon Township, Michigan
  • Mastodon (comics), a comic book character who plays a minor role in the backstory of Wolverine

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conservation status of a species is an indicator of the likelihood of that species continuing to survive either in the present day or the future. Many factors are taken into account when assessing the conservation status of a species: not simply the number remaining, but the
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Scientific classification or biological classification is a method by which biologists group and categorize species of organisms. Scientific classification also can be called scientific taxonomy, but should be distinguished from folk taxonomy, which lacks scientific basis.
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Chordata
Bateson, 1885

Typical Classes

See below

Chordates (phylum Chordata) are a group of animals that includes the vertebrates, together with several closely related invertebrates.
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Mammalia
Linnaeus, 1758

Subclasses & Infraclasses
  • Subclass †Allotheria*
  • Subclass Prototheria
  • Subclass Theria

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Proboscidea
Illiger, 1811

Groups

†Jozaria
†Anthracobunidae
†Moeritheriidae
Euproboscidea
†Numidotheriidae
†Barytheriidae
†Phiomiidae

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extinction is the cessation of existence of a species or group of taxa, reducing biodiversity. The moment of extinction is generally considered to be the death of the last individual of that species (although the capacity to breed and recover may have been lost before this point).
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genus (plural: genera) is part of the Latinized name for an organism. It is a name which reflects the classification of the organism by grouping it with other closely similar organisms.
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Proboscidea
Illiger, 1811

Groups

†Jozaria
†Anthracobunidae
†Moeritheriidae
Euproboscidea
†Numidotheriidae
†Barytheriidae
†Phiomiidae

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M. primigenius

Binomial name
Mammuthus primigenius
Blumenbach, 1799

For the rock band, see .

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Elephantidae
Gray, 1821

Subfamilia
  • See Classification
The elephants (Elephantidae) are a family in the order Proboscidea in the class Mammalia.
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Herbivory is a form of predation in which an organism known as an herbivore, consumes principally autotrophs[1] such as plants, algae and photosynthesizing bacteria.
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Grazing generally describes a type of predation in which an herbivore feeds on plants (such as grasses), or more broadly on a multicellular autotrophs (such as kelp). Grazing differs from true predation because the organism being eaten is not killed, and it differs from parasitism
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Pleistocene megafauna is the set of species of large animals -- mammals, birds and reptiles -- that lived on Earth during the Pleistocene epoch and are now extinct. These species appear to have died off as humans expanded out of Africa and Eurasia, the only continents that still
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glacier is a large, slow moving river of ice, formed from compacted layers of snow, that slowly deforms and flows in response to gravity. Glacier ice is the largest reservoir of fresh water on Earth, and second only to oceans as the largest reservoir of total water.
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Picea
Link

Species
About 35; see text.

Spruce refers to trees of the genus Picea, a genus of about 35 species of coniferous evergreen trees in the Family Pinaceae, found in the northern temperate and boreal (taiga) regions of
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1 kilometre =
SI units
0 m 0106 mm
US customary / Imperial units
0 ft 0 mi
A kilometre (American spelling: kilometer, symbol km
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Commonwealth of Kentucky

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Nickname(s): Bluegrass State
Motto(s): United we stand, divided we fall

Official language(s) English[1]

Capital Frankfort

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Nova Scotia
Nouvelle-Écosse, Alba Nuadh

Flag Coat of arms
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City of Fort Wayne, Indiana

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Nickname: The Summit City
Motto: Ke Ki On Ga
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The State of Indiana

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Nickname(s): The Hoosier State

Motto(s): The Crossroads of America

Official language(s) English

Capital Indianapolis (785,597)

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M. primigenius

Binomial name
Mammuthus primigenius
Blumenbach, 1799

For the rock band, see .

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The mastoid process is a conical prominence projecting from the undersurface of the mastoid portion of the temporal bone. It is located just behind the external acoustic meatus, and lateral to the styloid process.
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Writing system: Greek alphabet 
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