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‘Fully preserved’ Ice Age find is thought to be around 30,000 years old

A juvenile mammoth tusk, described as a “special” find by palaeontologists, is to be displayed in a March museum this half-term.

The well-preserved tusk, which is nearly a metre long, will go on show at the Fossils Galore museum and educational activity centre in March until February 18.

The museum is run by Jamie Jordan, a palaeontologist who was asked to identify and preserve the tusk.

Palaeontologist Jamie Jordan with the "fully-preserved" tusk of a juvenile mammoth which once roamed our region during the Ice Age.

He told the Peterborough Telegraph he “couldn’t believe it” when gravel extraction workers unearthed it in a Cambridgeshire quarry in February 2022.

His investigations revealed the tusk was between 28,000 and 30,000 years old.

Jamie said that, while it is not uncommon to find adult mammoth remains within our region, the same cannot be said of younger mammoths.

“Juvenile material of mammoths just doesn’t really survive,” he explained, “because it’s so fragile.”

The tusk - which is thought to be around 30,000 years old - will be on display at the Fossils Galore museum and educational activity centre in March until February 18.

The 33-year-old palaeontologist reckoned the site of the remains – in what was an old Ice Age river channel with silt at the bottom – probably helped the tusk to stay in such good condition.“It was found in a very silty sort of layer, which has lots of plant matter in there and is quite sandy as well.”

Jamie believes this had a cushioning effect which helped keep the tusk “packaged up, ready for all the glacial melt [and] gravel to run over the top of it.”

The indications are that the tusk came from a mammoth a few metres long, around 1.5 metres tall, and weighing close to a tonne.

The animal would’ve been about eight to ten years old and roamed the tundra in our local area towards the end of the Ice Age.Jamie is thrilled that the tusk is to go on show, especially as he initially thought the tusk had “no chance” of surviving the 12-month preservation stage.

A year later things look very different: “Low and behold it’s taken us nearly a year to get it to this stage,” he said, “and now it’s fully preserved and ready for display.”The tusk will be on show at Fossils Galore throughout February half-term.

After that, it will return to be displayed at the quarry where it was discovered.

Rare Ice Age mammoth tusk discovered in Cambridgeshire quarry goes on display at Fossils Galore in March