Ten Thumb-area teachers will help U-M paleontologists unearth the remains of an 11,000- to 13,000-year-old mastodon next month in Tuscola County, Mich.
The excavation is a joint project between U-M and the Fowler Center for Outdoor Learning in Mayville, which owns the property where bones of a mastodon—an extinct relative of the elephant—were discovered two years ago. The bones were exposed by natural erosive processes.
“In addition to its scientific importance, our work at this site will enable teachers from the region to experience the thrill of discovery and to pass it on to their students,” said Dan Fisher, director of the U-M Museum of Paleontology and professor in the departments of Earth and Environmental Sciences, and Ecology and Evolutionary Biology.
