Biotic assemblage associated with a mastodon skull from Oakland County, Michigan

by Warren P. Stoutamire and William S. Benninghoff

 

Abstract

This skull unearthed from a highway excavation near Pontiac was not in situ. Plant material, dominantly conifer, taken from sediments in the skull, were analyzed and carbon dated as 11,900+ or -350 years B.P. The different types of material permit reconstruction of the late-glacial environment of a shallow lake near a sedge marsh. The presence of Tasmanite-like bodies and a Lepidodendron megaspore indicate that rock flour from Paleozoic sediments was contributed to the deposit. Associated fossil mollusks are smaller than the living specimens of the same taxa. The skull itself, fragment of Mammut americanum Kerr, was treated with Alvar preservative making its carbon-dating unreliable.