Mammoth from Babine Lake, British Columbia

• Published in: Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences
• Main Authors: Harington, C. R., Tipper, H. W., Mott, R. J.
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Canadian Science Publishing 1974
• Subjects: Tundra
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1139/e74-025; http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/pdf/10.1139/e74-025

Remains of a partially articulate mammoth skeleton were exposed during stripping operations at a mining site on Babine Lake, central British Columbia. The bones lay in silty pond deposits in a bedrock depression, and were overlain by a thin layer of gravel and a thick layer of glacial till. Although no molar teeth were found, limb proportions show that the specimen was a large mammoth, like the Columbian mammoth (Mammuthus cf. M. columbi). Two radiocarbon dates of 42 900 ± 1860 yr B.P. and 43 800 ± 1830 yr B.P. on wood from the silty fossiliferous layer, and another of 34 000 ± 690 yr B.P. on mammoth bone suggest that the animal sank in sticky pond deposits and died there. Paleobotanical evidence indicates that, during this part of the Olympia Interglaciation, the vegetation near Babine Lake was similar to present shrub tundra just beyond the treeline in northern Canada.