Lifetime mobility of an Arctic woolly mammoth

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleResearchpeer-review

Authors

  • Matthew J. Wooller
  • Clement Bataille
  • Patrick Druckenmiller
  • Gregory M. Erickson
  • Pamela Groves
  • Norma Haubenstock
  • Timothy Howe
  • Daniel Mann
  • Katherine Moon
  • Ben A. Potter
  • Jeffrey Rasic
  • Joshua Reuther
  • Beth Shapiro
  • Karen J. Spaleta
  • Amy D. Willis

External Organisational units

  • Alaska Stable Isotope Facility
  • University of Ottawa
  • University of Alaska Museum of the North
  • Florida State University
  • University of California, Santa Cruz
  • Liaocheng University
  • National Park Service
  • University of Washington, Seattle
  • Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology

Abstract

Little is known about woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius) mobility and range. Here we use high temporal resolution sequential analyses of strontium isotope ratios along an entire 1.7-meter-long tusk to reconstruct the movements of an Arctic woolly mammoth that lived 17,100 years ago, during the last ice age. We use an isotope-guided random walk approach to compare the tusk's strontium and oxygen isotope profiles to isotopic maps. Our modeling reveals patterns of movement across a geographically extensive range during the animal's ~28-year life span that varied with life stages. Maintenance of this level of mobility by megafaunal species such as mammoth would have been increasingly difficult as the ice age ended and the environment changed at high latitudes.

Details

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)806-808
Number of pages3
JournalScience
Volume373.2021
Issue number6556
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 13 Aug 2021