Not elder law: scientists id path of ancient wooly rhino

The 460,000-year-old skull of a woolly rhino,reconstructed from 53 fragments, is the oldest example of these mighty,ice age beasts ever found in Europe.  The extinct mammals reached a length of three-and-a-half metresin adulthood and, unlike their modern relatives, were covered in shaggyhair.Details of the work appear in the journal Quaternary Science Reviews.  The team says the find from Germany fills a gap in our understanding of how these animals evolved.

“This is the oldest woolly rhinoceros found in Europe,” saidRalf-Dietrich Kahlke, from the Senckenberg Research Institute inWeimar, Germany.  He added: “It gives us a precise date for the first appearanceof cold-climate animals spreading throughout Asia and Europe during theice ages.”

Source/more:  BBC,