Exploring the Mammoth: Uncovering New Discoveries

[Andre]

I feel like discussing Mammoths. Some of us may remember http://www4.nau.edu/amqua/v29n2/jarkov_mammoth.htm in 1999 that made the "Good Morning America" TV-news. After that it became silent again and Mammoths are history. However...

I happen to know the guy on the left hand side of the http://www4.nau.edu/amqua/v29n2/images/mammoth_tusks.gif pretty well -he is truly amazing- and I'm allowed to peek over his shoulder every once and a while -on the cutting edge of paleonthology. There have been made a couple of exciting Mammoth mummy discoveries that just about nullify that Jarkov Mammoth. It also shows us that we have no clue whatsoever about the real character of climate of the ice age and that's my speciality.

So, shall I proceed?

 

[Integral]

Yes, Please.

 

[pebrew]

yes, please do proceed, andre.

i'm particularly interested in the conditions under which these animals would have frozen. that is, if the local climate appears to have quickly become cold or if it slowly cooled and the mammoths died in normal (for them) cold weather. do they know if these animals froze to death or froze after some other natural death?

have they thawed any of the mammoths?

 

[Andre]

Okay, I'll be happy trying to answer all these questions. the main subject of this thread, then will be the http://newsfromrussia.com/main/2004/04/29/53711.html (nothing scientific published yet) and especially:

in the conditions under which these animals would have frozen.

Exactly! Excellent observation. It puzzles me too. Things simply do not add up at all.

More later.

 

[Andre]

I just got the word that the very impressive material from the "Yukagir Mammoth" that I got, is still under moratorium, until end November after a conference. Please remind me by 17 November. In the mean time we can have a look at the existing material. A working img function would greatly enhance the posibilities to underline your story with educational visual support material. It seems that PF is about the last forum without that.

 

[Andre]

Let's start off with the http://www.yukonmuseums.ca/mammoth/

Let's have a look at the http://www.yukonmuseums.ca/mammoth/abstrmol-mor.htm (notice the name Dick Mol, he is worlds Mr Mammoth nr1)

Remains of the Jarkov Mammoth

The following remains (followed by the CERPOLEX / Mammuthus catalogue number) of the Jarkov Mammoth have been excavated: Left tusk (2001/341), right tusk (2001/342), maxilla with M3 sin. et dext. (2001/339), mandibula (2001/340), vertebra thoracalis (2001/323), costae (2001/324 to 2001/337), radius dext. (2001/321 + 2001/338), ulna dext. (2001/322). The block is containing many non-numbered skeletal parts and soft tissue. The block is numbered 2001/XXXA. These remains are stored in the underground ice cave in Khatanga. Samples of both bones and hair/wool have been taken for DNA research by Ross MacPhee (American Museum of Natural History, New York) and by Regis Debruyne (Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle, Paris). Several samples of the tusks have been drilled out by Daniel Fisher (Ann Arbor, Michigan) for tusk analysis. Results will become available in the near future. About 15% of the upper layer of the block has been defrosted so far. The sediments from the block are stored in frozen condition in the ice cave.

Paleoecological results

Microfossils (pollen, algae, fungal spores) were studied in sediment samples taken from between the hairs of the Jarkov Mammoth. The analysis of microfossils was combined with the identification of fruits, seeds and vegetative plant remains. The pollen spectra are dominated by Poaceae, Artemisia and Papaver. Macrofossils of these taxa were also present. Mosses such as Racomitrium lanuginosum, Pogonatum cf. P. urnigerum and cf. Polytrichum piliferum indicate dry, sandy or stony environments, with cryogenic phenomena as well as disturbance as a consequence of trampling or grazing. The vegetation reconstruction based on the recorded microfossils and macroremains indicates a steppe (cool and dry climatic conditions), and this fits well with the reconstructions based on palynological studies of lake sediments in Taimyr (Andreev et al. 2002; Hahne and Melles 1999). But some mosses (Calliergon giganteum, Drepanocladus aduncus, Rhizomnium pseudopunctatum) and the alga Pediastrum indicate that some wet sites were also present in the predominantly dry landscape of Taimyr. The abundance of ascospores of the dung-inhabiting fungus Sporormiella (Davis 1987) and Sordaria type (Van Geel 2001, Van Geel et al. 2003) is a clear indication of a high population density of herbivores.

also:

This event in 1999 was the start of the CERPOLEX / Mammuthus programme "Who or What Killed the Mammoths" to contribute to the unsolved questions on the extinctions of the Pleistocene megafauna around 10,000 BP.

We will answer that question.

Anybody interested in attending the 4th conference next year?

 

[NileQueen]

Next year, if you mean the Hot Springs Conference, it is the World of Elephants which is somehow different from the Mammoth Conferences. Since they had that 3rd one last year, the next will be five years after that I think, so 2008?
I think this is the 2nd World of Elephants Congress...

 

[Andre]

There is a new book, called:

"Discovering the Siberian Mammoth".

It even has an ISDN 90-808949-I-5 The first author is, you guessed right, Dick Mol. I have a few copies here. It is sensational. It's not in the bookstore (yet). The moratorium ends next week 17 november when it will be introduced at a congress, presenting the latest -most stunning discovery- to date, that Yugakir Mammoth that I opened the thread with.

It is definitely beating everything we have about Mammoths so far.

There is a place with a few thousend copies of the book but Dick has no definite distribution plan yet. So how are we going to get the news to the world?

 

[Locrian]

High population of herbivores... does that suggest then that conditions were different during the time of the mammoth than we might have guessed?

 

[Andre]

Yes that's the main mammoth message. It has puzzled scientist over two centuries how those pachiderms could survive arctic conditions in the middle of the last ice age. Mammots are the symbol of this impossibility and hence they are not on the scientific agenda.

However, evidence is mounting that climate has been very enigmatic througout the Pleistocene (2,5 million years - 11,670 years) indeed, especially in the late part. But lot's of independent evidence is emerging telling the same message.

There have been trees growing practically on the North Pole only a few thousand years ago:

A Holocene marine pollen record from the northern Yenisei Estuary
(southeastern Kara Sea, Siberia)
Kraus, M et al

A 780 cm long sediment core from the northern Yenisei Estuary (southeastern Kara
Sea) was analysed for pollen to reconstruct the Holocene vegetation and climate history
of the coastal area of the Kara Sea region. The core shows a high and continuous
deposition of sediments from 8900 yrs BP (9400 cal. BP) to ca. 600 yrs BP. A
pronounced change of the lithology and the occurrence of marine to brackish water
dinoflagellate cysts and molluscs indicate that the core location was reached by sea
water at 8600 yrs BP (9200 cal. BP) when the global sea-level was approximately 30m
below the present level. The depositional environment changed gradually from fluvial
to estuarine conditions.

Favourable climatic conditions with higher mean temperature than at present and a
widespread occurrence of spruce in boreal forests in the hinterland prevailed between
8900 and 7400 yrs BP (9400 to 8300 cal. BP).

http://www.awi-bremerhaven.de/Publications/Kra2003a.pdf

It should be clear that our understanding of the true character of the Pleistocene and the early Holocene is likely to be totally wrong.

 

[Andre]

Please remind me by 17 November

That's today here. Dick Mol is presenting the study about the new Yukagir mammoth in the conference in Yarkutsk (Russia). This is supposed the be the prime eyecatcher on Expo 2005 in Japan.

The next evening I'll link to a few details about that astonishing Yukagir mammoth

About that new booklet I introduced two posts upwards (size european A4 - 36 pages at least one picture on every page) about Mammots including the details of the last discoveries like the astonishing Yukagir Mammith. It would sell for ten Euros (about the cost price). For the moment I will take care of the mailing costs, unless the success would ruin my financial situation. PM me if you are interested and we will see how we can deal with the dirty details.

For the record this is not an commercial intend. I will loose money anyhow but that's not important.

 

[Andre]

Presenting the Yukagir Mammoth

Today the results of the investigation of the Yukagir Mammoth have been presented in Yarkutsk, Siberia and as promised, http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/yukagir.jpg he is.


Some technical details from the presentation of Dick Mol:

Autumn of 2002 discovered by Mr. V. Gorokhov near Maxunuokha River Yakutia, Arctic Siberia, Russia (GPS 71° 52’ 988” North - 140° 34’ 873” East).
September 2002, head extracted from the permafrost.
June 2003 brief survey CERPOLEX/Mammuthus, Mammoth Museum in Yakutsk,. More remains discovered.
September 2003 excavated front leg and parts of the intestines.

Carbon dating:
Three samples of bone, skin and hair (June 2003):
Bone 18,510 +/- 80 BP
Skin 18,510 +/- 100 BP
Hair 18,680 +/- 100 BP
Average: 18,560 +/- 50 BP
Cross-check (AMS) Tucson, Arizona, USA, :
Bone (rib) 18,160 +/- 110 BP

First impression average-sized male
Large spirally-twisted tusks typical for an old individual
Entire left front leg: shoulder height 272.5 cm
Combined data leg forefoot: 282.9 cm.

Note the latitude 71 degrees North. Awfully close to the North Pole, I say. :
I wonder why there not a trace of Mammoths in the Scientific Basis of the IPCC. (Global warming)

 

[Andre]

The smoking gun

I wonder why it's so silent here. Did you guys not find the link to the pics that I hid somewhere?

http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/yukagir.jpg

Anyway, this is an outstanding study about the environment of the Mammoths:

http://www.awi-bremerhaven.de/Publications/Sch2002g.pdf

I would recommend to study it thorougly and find the smoking gun to the extinction of the Mammoths. It's in there.

Earlier I said

This event in 1999 was the start of the CERPOLEX / Mammuthus programme "Who or What Killed the Mammoths" to contribute to the unsolved questions on the extinctions of the Pleistocene megafauna around 10,000 BP.

We will answer that question.

I couldn't dream for such clear evidence. Now, what would be that smoking gun, my dear Watson?

Hint: a old thread here is pointing to the right direction.

 

[Andre]

What is this? Don't you guy like solving riddles.

Think isotopes.

 

[Locrian]

I like riddles, but I don't know anything about this one. In fact, I dont' even know exactly what the riddle is, much less can guess at the answer. This is to be expected, since I know virtually nothing about prehistoric wheather.

Sorry :(

 

[Andre]

Okay, I have the first concept of the paper ready about 8 pages, intended to be readable for non-specialists.

If you'd like to look at it PM me. I hope to get it published somewhere.

 

[Andre]

The other day I hinted that http://www.awi-bremerhaven.de/Publications/Sch2002g.pdf contains the smoking gun for the extinction of the mammoth.

That smoking gun is Fig 5 on page 7, the fourth graph, d13C. And the murder weapon was the clathrate gun. This is why we think to know (almost for sure)

Clathrate gun kills Mammoths
by Andre and cowriters

ABSTRACT

The extinction of the mega fauna of the Mammoth steppe at the end of the Pleistocene is investigated. Using some examples of mummified Mammoth remains, we contend that the normal biotope for Mammoths is an arid steppe, not an arctic tundra like the current locations in North Siberia where most mammoth remains are recovered. We review traditional possible causes for extinctions (ill, kill, chill). The evidence for immense epidemics and over hunting appears to be increasingly inadequate while climate change gains substantiation. More than possible temperature changes, it is specifically the widespread increase in precipitation at the termination of the Younger Dryas 11,500 years ago, which appears to be the main culprit.

We propose that the clathrate gun -massive and multiple release events of methane gas from ocean (methane hydrate or clathrate) sediments is the direct cause of that change in precipitation pattern. We investigate independent sources of evidence: scars on the ocean floor on clathrate fields; precipitation changes in several proxies; short carbon dioxide spikes detected by fossil leaf stomata; calibration platforms of radiocarbon dating and stable carbon isotope behavior. We estimate the numerical effect of clathrate gun events on atmospheric gas concentration and isotope ratios with some basic calculations. We infer that the clathrate gun has considerable and immediate effect on numerous proxies. This puts question marks to the current interpretations of events. like the stable isotopes in ice cores that are assumed to be paleo-thermometers. We speculate about the required revisions of ice age theories.

*******************

The paper is over 11 pages and growing with an additional reference list of three pages.

Questions?

 

[Andre]

Oops, do I have to go to theory development now?

Especially since I'm forming a new idea about the mummification of Mammoths. They were not deep frozen. It couldn't be, considering the long lasting warmer climate in Siberia especially during the holocene thermal maximum around 8000 years ago when the area was boreal spruce forest and peat bogs. Yet, The mammoth mummies survived all that.

 

[Andre]

I have the honor of translating the concept book that will be telling the story of the discovery of the http://home.wanadoo.nl/bijkerk/yukagir.jpg from Dutch to English.

I hope that the author agrees to be one of the coauthors of that aforementioned paper. He certainly agrees on the first paragraph.

But the work is hard. Deadlines are killing. It must be available at the Expo 2005 in Japan.

A little bit of tiny yet world news. The Woolly Mammoth also has Musth glands like elephants.

http://www.thai-elephants.com/anatomy.html

It was first discovered on the Yukagir Mammoth

 

[Andre]

I do wonder where everybody went. Let me quote a part of the paper, dealing with the relation between http://www.awi-bremerhaven.de/Publications/Sch2002g.pdf and the clathrate gun and some quantitative estimations. I consider the latter the weakest part because I have to make some assumptions.

Anyway, when the clathrate gun fires it releases large amounts of d13C depleted methane in the air. The methane oxidizes quickly to carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, lowering the overall d13C signature in the CO2 that enters the food chain. So the plant remains in the soil would also have a much more d13C depleted signature when the clathrate gun fired. This takes us back again to the comprehensive study of Schirrmeister et al. about the paleoclimate and paleontology of Northern Siberia during the last 60,000 years. We find this graph (fig 5 - page 7) suggesting clear proof of the clathrate gun. We see the sudden steep negative d13C spike at around 13,000 PB years (or about 15.500 Cal BP years), apparently coinciding with the Bolling Allerod event to be interrupted a little shortly possibly indicating the Younger Dryas when the clathrate gun was silent. This would result into a tendency to normalize the isotope signature again by interactrion with the oceans etc. But then at 11,000 years the steep negative spike continues again, likely indicating the start of the Pre Boreal of the Holocene.

As a side step, note that a temperature rise would cause a tendency for an increased d13C ratio. Instead, the opposite is happening. Consequently this proxy does not support the alleged sudden warming at the end of the Younger Dryas. This may be the reason that Schirrmeister et al do not comment about this result in any way.

Clathrate gun.

Numerical simulation of a clathrate gun sequence have been carried out with the following parameters:

Atmospheric d13C 0 mil PDB.
Clathrate d13C typical-65 mil PDB.
Clathrate delta 14C negligible
1m3 Clathrate expands to 160 m3 methane of 1 hectopascal (hP) pressure.

Straightforward calculations of carbon transport reveals that a total increase of atmospheric CO2 from a typical ice age value of 200 ppm to a typical value of 280 ppm in the Holocene without other factors would require an accumulation of clathrate events with a total volume of 1300 km3. This would also lead to a radiocarbon platform of about 2700 years. This value compares well with the observed total combined radiocarbon platforms between 8000 BP and 15,000 BP (Kitagawa), supporting the clathrate gun hypothesis further. However there are complications. Maslin et al (2004) list 15 clathrate events dated between 8000BP and 17,700 BP with a total discharge of over 10,000 km3 Clathrate. Transport to the atmosphere would lead to a cumulative 820ppm atmospheric CO2. Meanwhile, the observed negative d13C spike of over 5 mil PDB in the proxy of Schirrmeister at the transition from Pleistocene to the Holocene would require only a discharge of about 270km3 clathrate, while the discharge of the required 1300 km for the observed increase in CO2 and radiocarbon platform would have lead to a negative d13C spike of 18,6 mil PDB and the total discharge of 10,000 equals to an d13C drop of -50 mil PDB. Apparently observing this effect, Maslin concluded initially that the Clathrate gun was firing blanks (Maslin 2002).

Obviously, with multiple evidence supporting the events, a better explanation could be that the ocean absorbs most of the excess CO2 gas again. Moreover the constant gas exchange process at the ocean surface, accelerated directly due to clathrate events itself, tends to balance isotope ratios. We assume that this effect shows outstandingly in the comparison of the Dansgaard Oeschger events, including the Bolling Allerod, and the oceanic proxies of ODP hole 893A (Kennett et al 2000) where the termination of the event seem to be almost as abruptly as the onset. This effect would lead to both increasing atmospheric d13C and delta 14C however a residual value would remain due to the fractionation effect. It is believed that these residual value are visible as the noted negative d13C spikes (Schirrmeister et al) and the radiocarbon calibration platforms of the Bolling - Allerod events and the early Holocene (Kitagawa, Van der Plicht).

Furthermore, although Maslin accepts it, the radiocarbon dating of the major clathrate events are not lined up exactly in time with the onset of the Bolling Allerod event and the termination of the Younger Dryas. However, the discussed problems for carbon dating are even exaggerated for ocean floor sediment dating while clathrate guns increase uncertainties by changing ocean currents with variable 14C signatures. The increased outflow of 13C and 14C to the atmosphere during clathrate events would tend to give older indications and decreasing d13C indications. However this effect may be negligible compared to temperature changes due to changing ocean currents as a result of the induced flow of the methane. This would have considerable but unpredictable effect on the fractionation in micro fossils. Consequently d13C and delta 14C and hence age indication could be erratic.

Now please, I'd appreciate some feedback. Is this understandable or rubbish?

 

[pansessualismo]

MMMMhhh, interesting...
...but why are there tapirs then?
Do they have a function on this planet...?

 

[NileQueen]

Tapirs can teach us how to walk on the bottom of a lake and turn on a dime...
Do you have a function on this planet? Do I?

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/6273739/
Take a look, the star of the Japan Expo 2005

 

[Andre]

keep an eye open in the book store, next year for

"The Yukagir Mammoth - An Animal of the Cold Steppe"
by Dick Mol et al

It's going to be 56 pages, large format with many stunning pictures.

A sentence of the prologue:

"This book allows us to look over the shoulders of the investigating scientists as they skillfully unwrap the secrets of the Yukagir Mammoth"

A sentence from the Final Remarks:

"The purpose of this book was to pull the mammoth out of the mythological realm and into the real world dispelling widespread misconceptions."

Will probably out by March when the EXPO 2005 opens in Japan.

 

[Human Being]

Awesome Thread

Andre,

I am relatively new here, in spite of my registration date.
Your thread is extremely interesting to me! I don't have
enough time right now, but I plan on taking a good solid
look at this thread in the coming days. Incidentally, the
image you've linked to a few times comes up with a 404
error for me. Thank you for what you have contributed
thus far, and in the future! This is really good stuff.

 

[Andre]

You're welcome, HB
Sorry about the 404. Legal problems. May I substitute it with these?

http://www-1.expo2005.or.jp/en/newstopics/2004/pdf/040621_mammoth.pdf
http://www-1.expo2005.or.jp/ml/en/04/

(the right tusk is not that much bigger as it seems. The left one is still firm fixed in it's socket while the right one is loosely fit back)

BTW The first sentence that I gave from the book has been changed by the committee of editors, determined to formalize the language like "bikes" into "bicycles" etc. It now reads:

This book allows us to look over the shoulders of scientists as they skillfully reveal the secrets held by the Yukagir Mammoth in the cold, cold ground for some 20,000 years.

and I like these next sentences too:

No, the mammoth was not a lonely behemoth, dragging itself laboriously through the snow and ice of the North Pole in a raging blizzard, pursued by a pack of hungry, howling wolves. No, the Yukagir Mammoth tells us a very different story indeed.

Anybody If you pm me. I tell you how to get the little booklet "Discovering the Siberian Mammoth", also with stunning pictures.