AMERICANALMANAC (Charles McAdams) - Geomorphologist stumbles onto 2.5-million-year-old mastodon molar in California creek bed
A scientist surveying a California creek bed for a frog habitat project accidentally discovered a pristinely preserved Pacific Mastodon tooth estimated to be 2.5 million years old, now headed to Stanford University for research. Brigid Lynch, a geomorphologist with Balance Hydrologics, was picking through rocks in a San Mateo County creek bed when one caught […] The post Geomorphologist stumbles onto 2.5-million-year-old mastodon molar in California creek bed appeared first on American Almanac .
A scientist surveying a California creek bed for a frog habitat project accidentally discovered a pristinely preserved Pacific Mastodon tooth estimated to be 2.5 million years old, now headed to Stanford University for research. Brigid Lynch, a geomorphologist with Balance Hydrologics, was picking through rocks in a San Mateo County creek bed when one caught her eye. She photographed the oddly shaped stone and moved on. The next day, reviewing the image, she realized she wasn't looking at a rock at all. It was a mastodon molar, an upper left third molar from a beast that roamed Ice Age California. The accidental find, The Sun reported , has now been donated to Stanford University's Doerr School of Sustainability, where researchers plan…Open