Siberia: 39,000-year-old perfectly preserved cave bear fossils discovered in permafrost

Scientists in Russia have excavated a 39,000-year-old perfectly preserved cave bear and a cub fossil in mainland Yakutia, Siberia. The extraordinary finding is the world’s first cave bear bones to have been discovered so far, Russia’s state-run media outlet, The Siberia Times reported. Scientists dug up two complete fossilized bear carcasses. The adult bear, found with its teething intact, was so well preserved that its features such as the nose were intact despite permafrost.

[European cave bear Ursus Spelaeus. Credit: American Museum of Natural History, New York]

Scientist Dr. Lena Grigorieva was quoted saying in the report that it was the first and only find of its kind where a whole carcass of a soft-tissue bear was discovered by the scientists. The fossilized structure was completely preserved, with all internal organs in place, she said. In the imagery captured at the lab, the bear’s nose was totally intact. This was a peculiar finding in the research of the ancient creatures as in the past, there were only fossilized skulls and bones excavated at these sites. 

The recent finding of the carcass of the bear is of great importance to the whole world—Scientist Dr. Lena Grigorieva  reportedly said. 

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According to a Prehistoric wildlife archive reports, Ursus Spelaeus, better known as the cave bear is by far one of the most common Pleistocene mammals in the fossil record and was even known to be used by World War I the German army as a source of phosphates. There are at least two extinct bear species of the cave bears, Ursus Spelaeus and U. Deningeri, notable for its habit of inhabiting caves, where its remains are frequently preserved. Several fossils of skulls and bones have been discovered in the Pleistocene cave deposits from the Pleistocene Epoch period that lasted more than 2.6 million to 11,700 years ago.

[Scientist at the University of Tubingen studying the bones of the cave bear with gouges. Credit: Smithsonian Museum's magazine]

[Kansas Dept of Wildlife, Parks & Tourism shows a partially fossilized bear skull in Rock, Kan. Two sisters found the partially fossilized bear skull while kayaking the Arkansas River in south-central Kansas. Credit: Ashley Watt/Kansas Dept of Wildlife, Parks & Tourism via AP]

Larger than Kodiak and Polar bears

So far, Cave bear remains have been found in England, Belgium, Germany, Russia, Spain, Italy, and Greece, and parts of North Africa. The largest cave bears weighed up to 400 to 1,000 kg (about 880 to 2,200 pounds), and were bigger than the Kodiak bears (U. Arctos Middendorffi) of Alaska and the polar bears (U. Maritimus) of the Arctic. The recent remains of the bear will be observed by Russia’s Northeastern Federal University (NEFU) in Yakutsk, which is also the coldest city in the world. The study will be led by Dr. Grigorieva, who works at the University’s Institute of Applied Ecology of the North. 

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