The extinct Columbian mammoth was one of the largest elephants to have walked the Earth. It had impressive, spiralled tusks which measured up to 4.9m (16ft) long, making them world record holders amongst the elephant family.

Pronunciation of scientific name
MAM-oth

Statistics
4m (13ft) tall at the shoulder and up to 10 tonnes in weight.

Physical description
One of the largest elephants ever to have lived, the Columbian mammoth was like a large African elephant but with a more sloping back and long, spiralled tusks. One tusk from a mammoth found in Texas had a tusk measuring 4.9m (16ft), the longest of any of the elephant family. There is some debate as to how much hair the Columbian mammoths had and some scientists suggest that they had a full fur coat like the woolly mammoth. It is more likely that hair grew more extensively on some parts of the body, such as the top of the head, but that they were basically elephant-like with exposed naked skin, greyish in colour.

Distribution
Columbian mammoths ranged through the southern half of North America and south into Mexico.

Habitat
Columbian mammoths were widespread throughout grasslands and woodlands.

Diet
Mammoths were herbivores eating mainly grasses and other low growing plants. They also browsed on leaves, twigs and fruit.

Behaviour
Social life revolved around the female herds, with groups of related individuals staying together throughout their lives. Such herds would have numbered between 2-20 individuals, were led by a dominant matriarch and comprised a number of other adult females and their offspring. Female young would stay with the herd while males would leave when they reached 12-15 years of age.

Reproduction
Gestation was 22 months, after which a single young was produced and suckled until 2-3 years old. Adult males lived apart from the herds, joining them only during the breeding season to mate with receptive females. Adult males would have fought for access to the female herds at this time

Conservation status
Columbian mammoths became extinct approximately 12,500 years ago.

Notes
Certain plants in North America produce huge fruits which no modern American animals eat. Such plants do not therefore have a natural method of seed dispersal. One example is a tree called the Osage orange, which produces grapefruit-sized fruit. It is believed that large extinct animals such as the mammoths would have been the natural dispersal agents for this species. The fruit would have been eaten but the seeds would have passed harmlessly through the animal’s gut to be ejected with the dung, allowing them to germinate and colonise new areas.

History
The Columbian mammoth was a uniquely American species which evolved from an ancestor that colonised the New World about 1.5 million years ago. In Eurasia, this same ancestor evolved separately into the woolly mammoth.

Closest relative
Modern elephants.