Copy of a rhinoceros cave painting from cave of Font-de-Gaume, Dordogne, France.
Click on image for full size
Sketch by Lisa Gardiner

Digging Woolly Rhinos!
News story originally written on November 13, 2002

Scientists in England have found some old bones! They found the fossil bones of an ancient woolly rhino that have been protected within rocks for thousands of years.

Today, rhinos live in warm places like Africa and are not woolly. But long ago, when Earth was very cold and a blanket of ice covered much of the land, rhinos covered with woolly hair lived in cold places like Europe.

People who lived in Europe long ago made paintings of woolly rhinos on the walls of caves like the picture on the left. There are no more woolly rhinos alive today. They became extinct about 10,000 years ago.

Since they started digging the fossil rhino out of the rocks, the scientists have found in nearby rocks the fossils of many other large animals including three other rhinos, a mammoth, a reindeer, a horse, and bison as well as many plant and insect fossils.


Last modified November 8, 2002 by Lisa Gardiner.

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