Description
- Gomphotherium
- Miocene~Pleistocene Age
- River Find
- Beaufort, South Carolina
- The tooth measures approx. 7 3/4″ long x 4 1/8″ wide. There are remnants of a previously attached barnacle on one of the cusps.. very cool and VERY BIG tooth!!
Gomphotheriums had four tusks, two on the upper jaw and two on the elongated lower jaw. The lower tusks are parallel and shaped like a shovel and were probably
used for digging up food from mud. Unlike modern elephants, the upper tusks were covered by a layer of enamel. Compared to elephants, the skull was more elongated and low
indicating that the animal had a short trunk, rather like a tapir’s. These animals probably lived in swamps or near lakes, using their tusks to dig or scrape up aquatic
vegetation. In comparison to earlier proboscids, Gomphotherium had far fewer molars; the remaining ones had high ridges to expand their grinding surfaces. Gomphotherium sp.
inhabited dry wooded regions near lakes.
