Jarkov Mammoth

The Jarkov mammoth is a woolly mammoth, whose remains were discovered in 1997 on the Taymyr Peninsula in Siberia. The mammoth lived about 20,000 years ago. It was a male and died after age estimates based on dentition with 47 ± 2 years.

Discovery

In the summer of 1997, the brothers Simeon and Gennadi Jarkov, Dolgans discovered from the 800 km north of the Arctic Circle village Chatanga, about 240 km to the north at Noworybnoje, 12 kilometers south of the river Bolshaya Balachnja the curved, about 30 cm protruding from the bottom of the Tundra tip of a mammoth tusk. Gennady Jarkov reported the administration of the "Great Arctic Sapowednik " of the Fund. The Jarkows dug from a tusk and also discovered the second. Both tusks were still in their anatomically correct position. When the Jarkows tried to carry expose the Fund, they damaged the skull, mandible and maxilla remained largely intact. The reserve management not examined the Fund initially, so that the Jarkows contacted the well-known French entrepreneur and mammoth researcher Bernard Buigues.

Research

In May 1998, a group of subscribers, headed by Bernard Buigues Cerpolex / Mammuthus expedition ( CERCLES polaires Expedition ) excavated the remains of the skull. The skull there were a small piece of meat, skin, and a larger amount of guard hairs and under-fur hairs.

In September and October 1999, a 3 meter x 3 meter x 2.5 meter tall, 23 -ton block of frozen sediment in which the remains of mammoths were excavated, lifted on 17 October 1999 a helicopter Mil Mi -26 and transported on 18 October 1999 under the supervision of Bernard Buigues to an ice cave in Chatanga, which was created in the 1950s as a temporary storage for fish and meat. There he was at a constant temperature of - 15 ° C obtained. In the ice cave studied more than thirty-six scientists from around the world, including Russia mammoth expert Alexei Tikhonov, the Fund. The excavation and the current studies on Jarkov mammoths were recorded by the Discovery Channel.

Bone marrow and plant samples were sent to various laboratories for analysis of the mammoth. An age dating of the University of Utrecht with the C- 14 method yielded an age of 20,380 years.

Scientists have found that there were two periods in which the mammoths, the region near the Arctic Circle left, either in search of food or to escape flooding. 34000-30000 17000-12000 BC and BC The Jarkov mammoth lived between these two periods to 18,380 BC.