Prehistoric bones of sloth found at East Village site
DOWNTOWN SAN DIEGO More prehistoric bones – this time, those of a giant sloth – have been found at the East Village construction site of the Thomas Jefferson School of Law, the school said yesterday. But the bones are in poor shape and may not be salvageable.
The bones – part of a vertebra, as well as tooth and skull fragments – were unearthed Friday in a different part of the site from where whale and mammoth bones were found last month.
The sloth bones were found at about the same depth as the whale bones, indicating the sloth lived about 600,000 years ago.
Paleontologist Pat Sena of the San Diego Natural History Museum, who found the sloth bones, said the bones are poorly preserved.
Ironically there is a species of giant ground sloth that is named after the law school's namesake, Thomas Jefferson: Megalonyx jeffersonii. It is not known if the find is a Megalonyx jeffersonii.
Jefferson, thought of as the father of modern paleontology, had a strong interest in the fossils of huge creatures such as mammoths and giant sloths.
In case you are keeping score on the construction site finds:
The 500,000 year old Columbian Mammoth remains (skull, tusks and several foot bones) were found at the site on Feb. 3, 2009.
The California Gray whale skeleton was found on Feb. 26, in the exact same location, but 10 feet deeper, and is believed to have lived 600,000 years ago.
All three animals date from the Pleistocene Period -- the Ice Age.
-- Greg Gross