The skull will be be the centerpiece of a new ice age exhibit at a museum in Hillsboro.
ELLIS COUNTY, Texas — Mammoths roamed across North Texas tens of thousands of years ago, and the head of one of them will soon be on display, as a mammoth skull was uncovered in Ellis County last week.
According to Texas Through Time, a fossil museum, the Colombian Mammoth skull was dug up at a sand and gravel quarry.
This skull will be the centerpiece of a planned ice age exhibit at the museum in Hillsboro, which will feature many fossil found across Texas — including fossils from horses, camels, sloths and the Arctodus, or short-faced bear.
“This discovery marks the beginning of many aspiring paleontologists’ path to achieving their goals,” Texas Through Time Museum Director Andre LuJan said in a statement. “Opportunities to engage young curiosity seekers and get them interested in science is a once in a lifetime for many in socio-economically disadvantaged communities like ours.”
A near complete mammoth specimen, named Elli May, was found in 2018 and is on display at the Perot Museum of Nature and Science in Dallas.
This isn’t the only mammoth-related news to come out of North Texas this month. A Dallas-based biotechnology company, Colossal Biosciences, has raised $200 million toward its mission of bringing the mammoth back to life. That mission also includes reviving the dodo and the Tasmanian tiger.
Colossal said their teams – which consist of over 170 scientists and partners with labs in Boston, Dallas, and Melbourne, Australia – have made significant breakthroughs on all three of its main projects and is on schedule or even ahead of it to resurrect these animals.
“The technological advances we’re seeing in genetic engineering and synthetic biology are rapidly transforming our understanding of what’s possible in species restoration,” said Colossal’s Chief Science Officer Beth Shapiro. “While the path to de-extinction is complex, each step forward brings us closer to understanding how we might responsibly reintroduce traits from lost species. The real promise lies not just in the technology, but also in how we might apply these tools to protect and restore endangered species and ecosystems.”
