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Science and Technology


Museum explores mammals' extreme diversity
Evolution in overdrive on exhibit in Cleveland
by WKSU's JEFF ST. CLAIR


Morning Edition Host
Jeff St. Clair
 
Paleontologist Darin Croft is curator of 'Extreme Mammals' at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History. The huge model of Indricotherium cleared the exhibit's ceiling by only 1 inch.
Courtesy of Jeff St.Clair,WKSU
In The Region:

From the tiniest shrew to the giant Indricotherium, a new exhibit at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History explores the extremes of Mammalian evolution. 

'Extreme Mammals' features dozens of living and extinct creatures, whose noses, claws, horns, and habits range from the merely odd, to the truly bizarre.  

Palentologist Darin Croft is our guide as we discover what a human’s most extreme attribute is … but  we begin with mammals on the extreme of ugly…

 
Palentologist Darin Croft is curator of Extreme Mammals at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History -  the exhibit runs through April. 
Jeff St.Clair talks with curator Darin Croft

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(Click image for larger view.)

One of the oddest extreme mammal in the exhibit is Ambulocetus, the walking-whale.  This ancestor of modern whales led an amphibious existence but was already adapted to aquatic life with specialized teeth, ears, feet, and eyes on top of its head.  The original fossil was discovered by Hans Thewissen of NEOUCOM.
A life-like diorama depicts what part of the Arctic Circle once looked like, with tropical plants and large herbivores living on land now covered with ice.
A Smilodon, or saber-toothed cat, is trapped in the La-Brea tar of today's Los Angeles.  The specialized hunter of large game went extinct about 10,000 years ago, well after the arrival of humans in North America.
One of the oddest-looking mammals that ever lived is the extinct South American ungulate Macrauchenia (Mack-raow-KEEN-ee-a). Along with a camel-like body and a giraffe-like neck, it had one of the most extreme of noses: a long, flexible trunk, something like an elephant’s. Macrauchenia went extinct only around 10,000 years ago.
On loan from the Bronx Zoo, the naked mole rat colony is contained within a series of tubes and chambers.  The animals are native to Ethiopia.
Compared to many of the bizarre creatures in the Extreme Mammals exhibit, humans are relatively mundane.  Our most unusual feature, according to curator Darin Croft, is the human foot.
Naked mole rats are social mammals living in colonies similar to bees or ants.  The workers don't breed, instead a queen mole-rat produces all of the young.
The protruding incisors of the Naked Mole-Rat are used to dig tunnels in search of edible tubers.  The animal's cheek pouches can close behind the teeth so that dirt does not enter its mouth.
Dr. Darin Croft is curator of the 'Extreme Mammals' exhibit at CMNH.  Croft is an expert in extinct South American mammals, and several of his discoveries are included in the displays.
A distant relative of the armadillo, the armored Glyptodont was found both in North and South America.  The specimen on display here was found by Darin Croft in the Andes Mountains of Chile.
Listener Comments:

Nice photos, particularly the reconstructions !


Posted by: Dr. Alien (France) on August 11, 2012 5:08AM
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