Extinct cave lion cub in perfect condition found in Siberia raises cloning hopes

[WillParkinson]

http://siberiantimes.com/science/casestudy/news/extinct-cave-lion-cub-in-perfect-condition-found-in-siberia-rising-cloning-hopes/


The pre-historic animal was found in permafrost on the bank of Tirekhtykh River of the Abyisky district of Yakutia by a local resident Boris Berezhnov.

Excited scientists unveiled the discovery - its facial features clearly visible - in Yakutsk today.

The animal was aged around one and a half to two months old when it perished. It is not yet clear whether the cub was male or female.

Expert Dr Albert Protopopov said: 'It is a perfectly preserved lion cub, all the limbs have survived. There are no traces of external injuries on the skin.'

[sharp_stick]

1. Wow, that's something else

The preservation is incredible.

[Cattledog]

2. 50,000 years old!

[Laffy Kat]

3. Clone that kitteh!

What could possibly go wrong?

[HeartachesNhangovers]

4. Let it go. Extinction is a necessary part of evolution.

Darwin said evolution and extinction go hand in hand.

Instead of wasting resources on a species that has already lost the struggle to survive, spend those resources to protect existing wild habitat.

[WillParkinson]

6. But if they do that....

There won't be new hunting opportunities....

[cstanleytech]

7. Actually if we went fully that route the better way might be to invest more in

tech to allow our species to survive the potential extinction of all other life on the planet and or to travel to other planets in other solar systems as well as the tech to terraform other planets.

[eppur_se_muova]

5. Awww ... poor baby.

Momma probably never knew what happened to him.

[Judi Lynn]

8. Oops! Cave Lion Mummy Is Probably an Ice Age Lynx

By Laura Geggel, Senior Writer | November 14, 2017 04:08pm ET

A Russian man hunting for mammoth tusks in Eastern Siberia made an unexpected discovery in September: the incredibly furry, slightly squished mummy of a cat from the last ice age. Scientists are celebrating the rare discovery, but they're not certain on one major point — whether the mummy is a cave lion cub or a lynx kitten, paleontologists told Live Science.

If the kitten is a lynx, it would be only the second species of its kind from the last ice age to be uncovered in Beringia, a region encompassing parts of Russia, Alaska and Canada, said Olga Potapova, the collections curator and manager at the Mammoth Site of Hot Springs, South Dakota, who is helping with the logistics of studying the new specimen.

People have spent at least 300 years collecting and studying frozen bones and mummies in Eastern Siberia, and "that yielded just one fossil bone of this [lynx] species," Potapova told Live Science in an email. So, "the find of the complete mummy of this species would be very surprising and interesting," she said. [In Images: Ancient Beasts of the Arctic]

Astonishing discovery

Boris Berezhnev discovered the ice age kitty by the Tirekhtykh River in Eastern Siberia's Yakutia, a region about the size of India that has a population about equal to that of Delaware. Upon finding the furry, frozen mummy, Berezhnev's colleague notified scientists at the Academy of Sciences of Yakutia, who went to see the mummy at the academy just a few days later.

More:
https://www.livescience.com/60939-mummied-kitten-may-be-lynx-or-cave-lion.html?utm_source=notification