What would happen if mammoths were brought back? Helen Pilcher investigates <\/p>
The weren\u2019t just big, they were mammoth! With their thick shaggy fur, and long, curved tusks, woolly mammoths stood at 3 metres tall and weighed up to 7,000 kg. <\/strong><\/p> The last woolly mammoths went extinct around the same time that the Egyptians were building their pyramids. Parts of Siberia are littered with their remains. Teeth, tusks<\/a> and sometimes even entire frozen carcasses are being pulled from the ground as the world warms and the permafrost melts. This is providing the starting material for those who wish to bring it back.\u00a0<\/p> In its heyday, during the last Ice Age<\/a>, the woolly mammoth played a vital role in its Arctic steppe ecosystem<\/a>. As a keystone species<\/a>, it sculpted its own\u00a0ecosystem, and\u00a0created opportunities for other species to thrive. Mammoths trampled saplings, ate grass and other plants, and fertilised the ground\u00a0with\u00a0their nutrient-rich dung. This provided habitat and resources for many other species, including invertebrates, birds and mammals.<\/p> Climate change and hunting caused their numbers to dwindle. Then, when they disappeared, so did the ecological services they provided. Biodiversity<\/a>\u00a0dwindled\u00a0and the lush mammoth steppe was replaced by species-poor tundra.\u00a0De-extinction advocates argue that if\u00a0the animals could be returned to Siberia, their presence could help to recreate the Arctic steppe, in\u00a0all of\u00a0its former biodiverse glory.\u00a0<\/p> And that\u2019s not all. Today, the Arctic permafrost contains the remains of that rich, fertile Ice Age ecosystem. An estimated\u00a01,500 gigatons<\/a>\u00a0of\u00a0carbon is locked up in the icy ground. \u00a0That\u2019s\u00a0twice as much as in the atmosphere. As the world warms, the far north is thawing, and little by little the carbon is being released as gas. This could accelerate climate change, but it\u2019s not inevitable.\u00a0<\/p> Some think that mammoths could help to keep the Arctic cold. Studies show that when big grazers routinely trample the snow, they expose the surface of the soil to cold air, which helps to keep the ground frozen.<\/p> Research from biologist Sergey\u00a0Zimov, from Siberia\u2019s Northeast Science Station , indicates that soil temperatures in areas where big animals graze are, on average, several degrees colder than areas where grazers are absent. Return mammoths to the far north and they could\u00a0<\/em>help to keep the potentially dangerous carbon frozen away.\u00a0<\/p> There is certainly space for them.\u00a0Zimov\u00a0has created a 160km2<\/sup>\u00a0nature reserve, called\u00a0Pleistocene Park<\/a>, full of Ice Age animals including bison and musk oxen<\/a>. Should they be de-extincted, he would\u00a0be happy to\u00a0give the\u00a0woolly mammoths<\/a>\u00a0a home there.\u00a0<\/p> Whether or not the mammoths deliver on the\u00a0promises that are made of them\u00a0remains to be seen. The long-term goal of\u00a0all of\u00a0the current de-extinction projects is to return the animals to the wild, but no one knows for sure how these animals will fit in.<\/p> They could\u00a0<\/em>deliver the proposed biodiversity benefits, but they could also create problems. They might outcompete native species, for example, or be so successful that they\u00a0have to\u00a0be culled.<\/p> Mammoths could\u00a0<\/em>help to keep the Arctic frozen, but with a\u00a0lengthy gestation\u00a0period and then 15 years to reach sexual maturity, the numbers required won\u2019t be available any time soon. \u00a0There\u2019s also no knowing if a de-extinct woolly mammoth, born to\u00a0an Asian elephant<\/a>, will know how to behave like a mammoth. Just like elephants<\/a>, mammoths were social creatures\u00a0that lived in complex groups and learned from one another.<\/p> So, are plans to bring back the mammoth a brilliant idea or woolly thinking? Only time will tell.<\/p> \u00a0<\/p> <\/body><\/html>\n What would happen if mammoths were brought back? 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Helen Pilcher investigates","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/43773"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43774"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43773"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43773"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}When did woolly mammoths go extinct?<\/h2>
Why do scientists want to bring back the mammoths?<\/h2>
What would happen if the mammoths were brought back?<\/h2>
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