In 2020, prospectors seeking mammoth tusks in eastern Siberia found a bundle of fur protruding from the icy bank of the Badyarikha River. The diggers knew they were looking at something rare: the Ice Age mummy of a cat cub.
Scientists have studied mummified animals that roamed the steppes in the Pleistocene 30,000 years ago. That includes titans like mammoths and woolly rhinoceros, as well as small mammals like the cubs of wolverines and cave lions. But when the prospectors brought their little find to the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow, researchers there were delighted: They had just been handed the first-ever mummy of a saber-toothed cat.
The find, published on Thursday in the journal Scientific Reports, is the first time in 28,000 years that humans have laid eyes on a saber-toothed cat — at least since their extinction at the end of the ice age.
“Many paleontologists working with felids, including myself, have been hoping for decades to see a frozen saber-tooth felid from the permafrost,” said Manuel J. Salesa, a specialist in saber-toothed cats at the Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales in Madrid who was not involved in the paper. “This amazing find is one of the most exciting moments of my career.”
It is also the first discovery of a Pleistocene mummy from a family of animals with no surviving species, said Alexey Lopatin, a paleontologist at the Russian Academy of Sciences and an author on the paper.
Using CT scans to examine the cub’s bones, Dr. Lopatin and his colleagues confirmed that the 37,000-year-old mummy was a Homotherium, a rangy, lion-size cat with long forelimbs and heavy shoulders. The species was the last of the saber-toothed cats, which occupied a branch on the tree of life distinct from modern felines.
While bones of Homotherium cubs have been found, including a major discovery in a cave near San Antonio, the Russian specimen comes complete with flesh and fur. Dr. Lopatin and his colleagues estimate the cub was only three weeks old.
Some features, like the cub’s powerful neck, offer confirmation of earlier conclusions by paleontologists about Homotherium anatomy. Other traits came as a complete surprise.
The cub had pale tufts of hair jutting back and down from the corners of its mouth, hinting at sideburns or beards in adult cats. Its paws were rounded like a lynx’s, but with square pads, unlike those of modern cats. Surprisingly, the kitten had no carpal pads on its wrists, a feature common in cats and dogs — which may have helped it walk on snow, Dr. Lopatin said.
Then there was its fur, which was dark brown and soft. “Perhaps the most surprising thing,” Dr. Lopatin said.
Modern big cats that have solid-colored coats as adults — like lions and pumas — generally have spots as babies, said Ashley Reynolds, a paleontologist at the Canadian Museum of Nature who did not participate in the study. The absence of spots could be a result of how the fur was preserved, she said: “I’d like to see some detail on what degradation, if any, has happened to the fur.” But she noted that spotted hyena cubs can have dark-colored fur, and they are relatives of felines.
The cub also adds ammunition to a debate about saber-toothed cats — whether their famous, elongated fangs projected openly from their jaws, or were covered by an extended upper lip. While the kitten was too young for its elongated fangs to have formed, Dr. Lopatin said, the height of the upper lip is more than twice as long as that of a modern lion cub. This could support the claim that the sabers of the adult Homotherium were sheathed.
The initial report is just the beginning, Dr. Lopatin said. The team also plans to study the mummy’s DNA, and to perform closer examinations of the skeleton, muscles and hair. And he’s confident that at some point other Homotherium mummies might turn up as well.
“Let’s hope our Russian colleagues are lucky in finding the adults,” Dr. Salesa said. “That would be absolutely shocking.”
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