Long before Las Vegas was dominated by casinos and sports teams, it was overrun by megafauna like mammoths, bison, wolves, and mountain lions. Yet about a third of all fossils discovered at Tule Springs come from camelops, an ancient form of camel that was much larger than the contemporary counterparts we know today.
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Going Back to the Ice Age
The newly opened Ice Age Fossils State Park does a great job digging into the history of these once dominant creatures. The 300-acre site is a hotbed of fossils, dating back to about 100,000 years ago, a long time by human standards, but relatively recent in the Earth’s geographical timeline.
One of the first things you’ll notice when entering the Visitor Center is a giant skeleton of an adult camelops, which could almost be mistaken for a dinosaur at first glance. The fossil collection was discovered by UNLV paleontology students in 2011 and it’s believed the animal lived between 30,000 and 40,000 years ago – you know, give or take.
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Camels Actually Originated in North America
Also known as the Yesterday’s Camel or Western Camel, the camelops typically had a height of more than seven feet at the shoulder with a neck that stretched to about 12 feet when searching for food. They were plant eaters, but down for pretty much anything, using sharp teeth to rip through grass, leaves, and fruit during wet seasons and woody plants in times of drought.
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Herd Mentality
The camelops traveled in herds of up to 25 individuals, usually with a dominant male protecting the females and their young. They were highly organized, marching in single file lines. Fossils don’t tell us whether the camelops had one or two humps – or any at all. We also don’t know why the ancient camels went extinct in North America about 12,000 years ago.
The lineage of the camelops splits off into llamas and alpacas in South America and smaller, contemporary camels that are common today in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East.
Learn more about the awesomeness of the Ice Age Fossils State Park. [City Cast Las Vegas 🎧]
