Well-preserved fossil of a woolly mammoth has been discovered in a Siberian lake

After a five-day-long search, scientists have managed to retrieve the bones and faeces of a woolly mammoth from a shallow lake in Siberia. Almost 90 percent of the animal has been found.

Two expeditions were conducted in the silt of Lake Pechenelava-To in the Yamal peninsula to discover the well-preserved parts of the ancient animal, reported The Siberian Times.

Interestingly, the back of the spine of the mammoth was still connected with bits of tendons and skin.  “We have one front and one hind foot well-preserved, with tendons, soft tissues and pieces of skin,”  said Evgenia Khozyainova from Shemanovsky museum in Salekhard. Also, the tail of the animal was found in a preserved condition along with tendons and a big piece of skin.

Also, it is quite rare  to come across the excrement of an animal this near to the body itself. The faeces or the coprolite can give information about the diet of the woolly mammoth. The scientists from the Arctic Research Center of the Yamal-Nenets Autonomous District are sure that the fossilized faeces belonged to the mammoth.

Dmitry Frolov, head of the centre, told The Siberian Times that the coprolite was definitely left by this very mammoth and it was a very good find, as “it can contain a lot of information about the mammoth’s diet as well as the pollen of ancient plants, and a lot more”.

The adult mammoth (15 to 20 years old) skeleton is the third one to be found in the Yamal peninsula and is likely to be named Tadibe - after the hard work put in locals Konstantin, Yakov and Alexander Tadibe from the village of Seyakha, who had made the discovery in the first place. The animal was about 10 feet tall and an adult male.

Earlier, the world’s best-preserved woolly mammoth calf called Lyuba and Masha, a calf found in 1988, were discovered from the peninsula.