From the frozen ground of Siberia, a young woolly rhino has reemerged after spending over 32,000 years locked in permafrost. Its preservation is nothing short of remarkable: skin, hair, and even some internal organs remain largely intact. This find provides scientists with a rare and valuable opportunity to understand a megafauna species that roamed Earth during the last Ice Age.
“It’s mesmerizing,” said Valerii Plotnikov, a paleontologist involved in the study. “The feeling of touching something that lived tens of thousands of years ago is indescribable.”
Fat and Fur: A Life Adapted to the Ice Age
Discovered in 2020 along the banks of the Tirekhtyakh River in Russia’s far eastern Sakha Republic, this woolly rhino is thought to have been about four years old when it died. The remains, which scientists nicknamed the “Abyisky rhino,” are astonishingly well-preserved due to the permafrost. Though fossils of Ice Age animals are frequently found, mummies with such intact soft tissues are a rare occurrence, according to Love Dalén, a professor of evolutionary genomics at Stockholm University.
“There’s probably one in 10,000 where you run into something like this,” Dalén told CNN.
This particular rhino still had soft tissues, skin, and a fatty hump on its back — a feature that has never been physically observed in woolly rhino mummies before. Such fatty humps are common in Arctic animals, acting as energy reserves during the harsh winter months.
“We knew from skeletons and cave art that woolly rhinos had large shoulder humps,” Adrian Lister, a paleobiologist at the Natural History Museum in London told Ars Technica, adding that “maybe this is the first time fat has actually been discovered there, which for sure is a great discovery if so.”
The fatty hump, which reached up to 13 centimeters (five inches) in height, likely provided the rhino with essential energy to survive the frigid climate, almost like a thermal battery. Other Ice Age animals employed a similar trick. The Ovibos moschatus, or musk ox, possessed large fat deposits along their backs and necks. Likewise, the giant camel Paracamelus (the ancestor of modern camels) had a fatty hump that offered a survival edge during the long, dark Arctic winters.
The Abyisky rhino also sheds light on another intriguing aspect of Ice Age life: the changes in its hair as it aged. Young woolly rhinos sported lighter, softer fur, akin to a woolly mammoth calf’s coat. As they matured, however, their hair became darker and coarser. This transition, scientists believe, helped the rhino better endure the colder conditions as it grew.
But not all the fur survived intact. On one side of the rhino’s body, its remains were badly damaged, with internal organs exposed. Scientists hypothesize that predators may have scavenged parts of the body after death.
A Bigger Picture of Ice Age Ecology
Beyond its physical preservation, the Abyisky rhino holds clues about the broader environment it inhabited. Embedded in its fur were tiny crustaceans, water fleas, which no longer exist in the region today. These parasites reveal shifts in the local ecosystem over millennia.
The woolly rhino was one of the largest herbivores in its ecosystem, second only to the woolly mammoth. It roamed the grasslands of northern Eurasia, grazing alongside other Ice Age giants. Despite their similarities, mammoths and woolly rhinos inhabited distinct areas. For instance, while mammoths managed to cross into North America across the Bering Strait, woolly rhinos never did. The reasons behind these patterns remain a mystery to scientists.
Paleontologists are hopeful that further studies will unlock more secrets from this ancient rhino. “The stomach might still be intact,” noted Albert Boeskorov, a paleontologist leading the research. If so, the animal’s last meal could offer invaluable insights into its diet and environment.
As the Arctic warms, more prehistoric creatures like the Abyisky rhino may emerge from the melting permafrost. However, the rapid thawing due to climate change is a double-edged sword: while it may reveal more preserved specimens, once exposed to air, they can rapidly deteriorate.
As such, this discovery was a race against time. As the climate changes, we have to move quickly before these ancient treasures degrade beyond recovery.
For now, the Abyisky woolly rhino offers a rare and detailed snapshot of life during the Ice Age—a period of time that continues to captivate scientists and the public alike.
The findings appeared in the journal Doklady Earth Sciences.
