Preliminary communication

Ice age: Podravina fossils from distant past

Jurica Sabol orcid.org/0000-0002-5580-3228 ; Krapina Neanderthal Museum, Krapina, Croatia

Abstract

Cognition about the existence of long ice ages in distant past is widespread among general public thanks to animated films, but few people know that herds of woolly and prairie mammoths, woolly rhinos, extinct species of cattle, prairie buffalos and other species once rambled through Podravina. It is primarily thanks to private collections of Josip Cugovčan and Ivan Zvijerac, that scientists and wider public for the very first time had the opportunity to see fossil remains older than 500.000 years as a whole, collected along the Drava river and in private gravel fields and exhibited within the exhibition »Fossil treasure of Hrvatsko Zagorje and Podravina« in the Museum of Krapina Neanderthals. The exhibition comprised impressive remains of the woolly mammoth (teeth, fang, ribs, leg bones), teeth of the prairie mammoth, sculls of cattle ancestors and woolly rhino and antlers of the European deer, prairie buffalo, giant deer etc. Discovered and professionally processed fossils can’t provide precise stratigraphic data, since the remains are oversedimented, but they surely contribute to better comprehension of geological history of Podravina and raise awareness about importance of preservation of natural heritage.

Keywords

fossils; ice age; the Pleistocene; woolly mammoth; paleontology; prairie

Hrčak ID:

221602

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/221602

Publication date:

3.12.2018.

Article data in other languages: croatian

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