Permafrost is becoming a lot less perma in many areas of the arctic, which has already led to the discovery of some well-preserved wooly mammoths. Now the thawing of long-frozen ground has unearthed a couple of well-preserved cave bear carcasses.
This has allowed the species, which was formerly known only from fossils, coprolites, and steamy historical romance novels, to be seen in the flesh for the first time.
Like anyone who's read a Crichton novel, my first thought was to hope that someone was going to gene-splice these things back to life. My second thought was to title this post "Pleistocene Park", but it appears that name has already been taken.
Maybe we'll get a really intact wooly rhino! (Most of the rhino finds thus far have been partial finds* or juveniles.)
Are you pondering what I'm pondering? Because I'm imagining the safari possibilities...
*The usual method of these things getting uncovered in colder years was via riverbank erosion in tundra country, which tended to kinda dismember the carcass by the time anyone came along to find it.
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