Wednesday April 12, 2006

Giant sloth found in Everglades

Come to daddy!

While digging around in the Everglades, working on a filter marsh, builders came across a 2-foot jaw bone.

The bone belonged to a Giant Sloth, the sort of which regularly roamed Florida about 12,000 years ago. Now, this may not be anything too far from the ordinary, but I’d say it’s pretty damn cool. This thing was the size of an elephant – the biggest mammal ever to have walked the earth. It was one of the animals that lived in North America when humans first spread across the continent, along with saber-tooth tigers, mastodons, and whatnot. Somehow, these bones survived in the everglades muck all these thousands of years.

Researchers from the University of Florida will poke around the site a little more before it gets covered with water for the filter marsh thing (part of the much delayed, $7.8 billion Everglades Restoration Project, natch). Whatever other animal parts there may be will stay there.

For extra credit, find the site on Google Maps. Keep in mind that the site is in the Southeastern part of Hendry County, and it’s 2,000 acres, probably accessible by a road of some sort . . . go to it!

Tags: , , · Post to del.icio.us, digg, reddit · Comment feed for this post: RSS, atom

  1. manola b    Wed Apr 12, 08:36 AM #  

    Hey Steve, maybe this was the critter you found in your backyard!



  2. "Gypsy" Ed Romany    Wed Apr 12, 08:51 AM #  

    OMG!! It’s my first wife!!



  3. The Python    Wed Apr 12, 09:13 AM #  

    Mmmmm. Looks tasty. Any left?



  4. gallivantered    Wed Apr 12, 01:53 PM #  

    as a parent who tries not to and gives in and takes my children to things like ice age-the meltdown, i cannot help but wonder if this sort of thing is orchestrated to boost ticket sales through relevant findings…?

    paranoid skeptic?

    most likely.



  5. Defeded    Thu Apr 13, 11:42 AM #  

    I think it’s sorta cute. If it doesn’t hook you.