The archaeological collection of the Local History Museum of Spassk-Dalny contains many different exhibits, including a mammoth tooth.

These huge animals had only four molars, which helped them grind plant food. Throughout a mammoth’s life, its teeth were replaced six times. The milk molars were changed three times and the permanent ones three times. A new tooth gradually pushed out the old one, and at certain times, a mammoth could have six or seven teeth simultaneously. In addition to the molars, a mammoth had two curved tusks.

As a mammoth aged, it completely wore down its last pair of teeth, after which it starved to death. Most often, the animal left the herd and went to a secluded place. Such territories are called mammoth graveyards.

A mammoth tooth resembles a grater made of individual plates, which were completely covered with enamel. The plates were firmly bonded together, forming a single whole. The rugged surface allowed a mammoth to handle any food. The curved tusks helped mammoths to dig through snow to find the large quantities of food they needed.

Scientists have found out that for normal life, especially in the cold winter period, a mammoth had to eat more than a ton of plant food per day. Modern science suggests that the structure of their teeth would even allow the animal to feed on coniferous trees.

For quite a long time it was believed that mammoths disappeared about 10 thousand years ago: all finds of mammoth skeletons on the territory of Yakutia and Alaska date back to this period. However, a group of scientists recently conducting research on Wrangel Island discovered remains of animals resembling tundra mammoths but significantly smaller in size. As it turned out, the researchers found a dwarf variety of mammoths that stood no more than two meters tall and weighed no more than two tons. In other respects, this new species matched the remains of tundra mammoths previously found in permafrost. All the discovered animals died no earlier than 3,700 years ago. Thus, it is reliably known that mammoths did not become extinct at the dawn of humanity, but much later. Nevertheless, the cause of their mass extinction still sparks scientific debate.