Scientists link ancient Arctic camel to modern breed OTTAWA (AP)
— Ancient, mummified camel bones dug from the tundra confirm
that the animals now synonymous with the arid sands of Arabia
actually developed in subfreezing forests in what is now
Canada’s High Arctic, a scientist said Tuesday. About 3.5
million years ago, Strathcona Fiord on Ellesmere Island’s west-
central coast would have looked more like a northern forest than
an Arctic landscape, said paleobotanist Natalia Rybczynski of
the Canadian Museum of Nature in Ottawa. “Larch-dominated, lots
of wetlands, peat,” said Rybczynski, lead author of a study
published Tuesday in the journal Nature Communications. Nearby
fossil sites have yielded evidence of ancient bears, horses,
deer, badgers and frogs. The average yearly temperature would
have been about 0 Celsius (32 Fahrenheit). “If you were standing
in it and watching the camel, it would have the feel of a
boreal-type forest.” The Arctic camel was 30 percent larger than
modern camels, she said. Her best