About 5 million years ago, mammoths appeared upon the earth.

These were a distant relative of the present day elephant, but lived in the much colder climate of Russia, China and Europe.

Their hair was almost three feet long, hence the name “wooly mammoth.”

These huge creatures stood eight to 10 feet tall and weighed as much as six tons.

Mastodons were much older on the evolutionary scale, showing up almost 30 million years ago. They were smaller than the mammoths and lived in slightly warmer climates.

Both have shown up as fossils in North America.

Males are known to have huge tusks, some as long as 15 feet.

The mammoth tusks were curved and sometimes so long they crossed back over each other. Mastodon tusks were somewhat shorter and straighter. These impressive features were used in fighting and defense against predators.

The teeth in these huge mammals were different. The mammoth teeth were flattened and used for grazing on grasses. The mastodon, on the other hand, had conelike humps on their molars, enabling them to grind up the woody plants and trees which comprised their diet.

As the mastodon gradually migrated to warmer climates, including Indiana and even further south, they lived more in forested areas than mammoths, which preferred flat plains and grasslands.

Fortunately for finding fossils in our area, Indiana had both.

The bones of these prehistoric creatures have been found all over the Hoosier state in almost all of our 92 counties. Most recently, bones of a mastodon were found near Seymour in a farm field. This occurred just a couple of months ago.

Another notable find was in Fort Wayne, where another huge mastodon skeleton was discovered. It is now in the Indiana State Museum.

Its name is “Fred.”

Hebron in Porter County, northwest Indiana, was the site where a person was digging a pond on their property and bones started showing up. They eventually located four or five mastodons.

Another was located south of Terre Haute near Oaktown.

The remains of about 300 mammoths and mastodons have been found in Indiana.

Unfortunately, these great animals became extinct about 10,000 years ago with a few isolated populations remaining around another 5,000 years.

Their demise was probably brought about by ancient hunters, climate change and disease.

Which brings me to the most interesting part of my story. Can these animals be brought back to life?

After watching every episode (numerous times) of Jurassic Park, I wonder if mammoths can be reproduced.

I have seen many documentaries on scientists searching for viable DNA from these creatures. Their idea is to use this DNA to cross with a modern elephant, which would produce a half elephant, half mammoth. They are fairly closely related, so, to me, it doesn’t seem unfeasible.

Then, the result could be crossed again with an elephant, resulting in an animal which is more mammoth then elephant, and so on. This would take many years to accomplish because gestation period for an elephant is about 22 months and the offspring would have to reach maturity to breed.

I realize I will not be around to see this come to completion, but I would like to see some progress in this area (I also want to still be alive when we land the first person on Mars.)

Susie and I spent six summers working with the Indianapolis Children’s Museum digging dinosaur bones in South Dakota.

With every tiny bit of earth removed, the excitement built while waiting to see the end of a bone buried for 65 million years come to daylight.

Being the first person to see and touch that piece of a real dinosaur was a thrill as each one was uncovered.

While the mammoth is not as old as the dinosaurs, I would still love to be included in a mammoth hunt while I am still able.

Creason can be reached at [email protected].