A well-preserved woolly rhinoceros from the ice age, with many of its internal organs still intact, was recovered from permafrost in the far north of Russia.
Russian media reported on Wednesday that the carcass was revealed by the thawing of the permafrost in Yakutia in August. Scientists are hoping that the ice roads in the Arctic region will become passable to deliver the animal to a laboratory for studies in January.
The carcass is among the best preserved specimens of the woolly rhinoceros found to date. Most soft tissues are still intact, including part of the intestines, some coarse hair and a lump of fat. His horn was found next to him.
In recent years, as the ice inside permafrost has melted more and more in vast areas of Siberia because of global warming, there have been significant discoveries of mammoths, woolly rhinos and cave lion cubs. A foal – known as the Lena horse – alive 42,000 years ago was found in the permafrost in the Batagaika crater in Yakutia, Siberia.
Yakutia 24 TV quoted Valery Plotnikov, a paleontologist from the regional branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, saying that the woolly rhino was probably three or four years old when he died. Plotnikov said the young rhino may have drowned.
Scientists dated the carcass 20,000 to 50,000 years ago. More accurate dating will be possible when radiocarbon studies can be done in a laboratory.
The carcass was found on the bank of the Tirekhtyakh river, in the Abyisk district, near the area where another young woolly rhinoceros was recovered in 2014. Researchers dated that specimen, which they called Sasha, 34,000 years old.