New Arizona fossil discoveries
The Eastern Arizona Courier reported that a skull of a 2.5 million year old rhynchotherium, relative of the extinct mastodon with four tusks, is being excavated on BLM lands near Safford. The species died out during the Pleistocene Epoch at the beginning of the most recent Ice Age. The complete article can be accessed at http://www.eacourier.com/articles/2007/04/30/update/friday/news01.txt.
Rhynchotherium and calf in the southeastern (what will become) US about 2 million years ago. Public photo from flickr.com
The fossil was discovered by Larry Thrasher, a geologist for the Bureau of Land Management in Safford, who also found bones from a fossil duck and three-toed horse.
Dr. Robert McCord, the chief curator and curator of paleontology for the Arizona Museum of Natural History, is in control of the skull’s restoration. Including the skull, Dr. McCord estimated the number of fossils found equated to approximately 40 percent of the entire animal.
In Gilbert, city officials announced the discovery of an upper-foreleg bone of a large camel known as camelops. Dr. McCord is quoted in the as saying "camelops measured 7 feet tall at the shoulder and roamed the earth between the late Pliocene period and the Pleistocene, until about 10,000 years ago. The exact age of the specimen found in Gilbert is hard to determine since the species thrived for almost
2 million years." It is the third discovery of a fossil camel family member in Maricopa County and the first record of camelops. The fossil find was made by crews building the South Water Treatment Plant. A news report on the find can be found at http://www.eastvalleytribune.com/story/117088.
Camelops
