Rare Mummified Baby Mammoth That Lived Over 30,000 Years Ago Has Been Found

A naturally mummified body of a baby woolly mammoth was found in Yukon, Canada, by a gold miner. The female calf was “the most complete find” in North America, with fully intact skin.

Experts named the calf “Nun cho ga” which means “big baby animal” in the local Hän language.

The baby was preserved through permafrost that mummified the body well through tens of thousands of years. She was found by Klondike gold miners on the fields located in the Trʼondëk Hwëchʼin Traditional Territory. Hairs of the woolly mammoth were even seen still attached to the skin.

Analysis of the body revealed that she may have lived alongside cave lions, giant steppe bison, and wild horses that were common in Yukon during its time.

Excited about the discovery, the Minister of Tourism and Culture Ranj Pillai released a statement, “The Yukon has always been an internationally renowned leader for ice age and Beringia research. We are thrilled about this significant discovery of a mummified woolly mammoth calf: Nun cho ga.”

“Without strong partnerships between placer miners, Trʼondëk Hwëchʼin, and the Yukon government, discoveries like this could not happen.”

The body caved in, but the skin was intact. Profiles on the hooves from wear and tear were also visible.

Yukon Paleontologist Dr. Grant Zazula mentioned in a statement, “As an ice age paleontologist, it has been one of my lifelong dreams to come face to face with a real woolly mammoth. That dream came true today. Nun cho ga is beautiful and one of the most incredible mummified ice age animals ever discovered in the world. I am excited to get to know her more.”

Nun cho ga has similar anatomy to another calf, Lyuba, found in Siberia in 2007.

Researchers who have continued researching the communities during the Pleistocene-Holocene transition period learned that overhunting was not why mammoths went extinct.

Evidence shows that these species survived as far as 5000 years ago, after a shifting climate that changed the common grasslands in Yukon to mosses and shrubs. New technology allowed McMaster Ancient DNA Centre experts to pinpoint the date better.

“Now that we have these technologies, we realize how much life-history information is stored in permafrost.”

“The amount of genetic data in permafrost is quite enormous and really allows for a scale of ecosystem and evolutionary reconstruction that is unparalleled with other methods to date.”

Ross MacPhee from the American Museum of Natural History further commented on this discovery, “Although mammoths are gone forever, horses are not. The horse that lived in the Yukon 5,000 years ago is directly related to the horse species we have today, Equus caballus.”

“Biologically, this makes the horse a native North American mammal, and it should be treated as such.”