SCIENTISTS have discovered two 14,000-year-old mummified “puppies” with their fur still intact and food still in their stomachs.
Hidden beneath deep layers of permafrost in Northern Siberia, the ice age creatures were initially thought to be domesticated dogs.
The well-preserved cubs 鈥 which turned out to be sisters 鈥 were later found to be were actually wolf cubs.
The 鈥淭umat Puppies,鈥 as they are known, contain traces of their last meal in their stomachs.
Scientists found the meat of a woolly rhinoceros and feathers from a small bird called a wagtail inside.
The mummified animals were found in 2011 and 2015 alongside woolly mammoth bones that were seemingly cut and burned by humans.
This initially suggested the wolf cubs might have been domesticated by humans who ate the meat before giving away the leftovers.
However, after the remains were studied, there was no indication that the pups got their food directly from humans.
They may have gathered the meat from humans鈥 mammoth butchering sites, researchers said.
Anne Kathrine Runge, an archaeologist at the University of York in the UK, analysed genetic data from the mummified creatures.
After extensive research, experts believe that the animals were two-month-old wolf pups with no evidence of interacting with people.
The sisters 鈥渋nhabited a diverse landscape that was also occupied by humans,鈥 they wrote, but 鈥渢his study found no evidence that can conclusively link them to human activities.鈥
How the wolf cubs died also remains a mystery.
“Neither showed signs of being attacked or injured either, which suggests that they died suddenly when the underground den collapsed, perhaps triggered by a landslide, and trapped them inside”, the study said.
Ms Runge said: “It was incredible to find two sisters from this era so well preserved, but even more incredible that we can now tell so much of their story, down to the last meal that they ate.
鈥淲hilst many will be disappointed that these animals are almost certainly wolves and not early domesticated dogs, they have helped us get closer to understanding the environment at the time, how these animals lived, and how remarkably similar wolves from more than 14,000 years ago are to modern day wolves.”
Nathan Wales, an ancient-DNA specialist at the University of York, said: “Today, litters are often larger than two, and it is possible that the Tumat Puppies had siblings that escaped their fate.
鈥淭here may also be more cubs hidden in the permafrost.鈥
The DNA testing showed that they likely belonged to a now-extinct population of wolves unrelated to today鈥檚 dogs.
Dogs and wolves are belived to be closely related.
However, they diverged genetically somewhere between 20,000 and 40,000 years ago, according to Live Science,
It comes after another mummified wolf pup dating back 57,000 years was unearthed in Canada – with its fur and teeth still intact.
The Ice Age creature’s head, tail, paws, fur and skin were perfectly preserved in the Arctic permafrost after it died aged just seven weeks.
Its remains dug up by a gold miner near Dawson City in the Yukon also included exceptional details of the muscle tissues.
The animal, a female, is thought to have died suddenly after its den collapsed.
The remarkable find opens a window to life in ancient Canada’s far north when woolly mammoths roamed the Earth.
It also sheds light on the seven week old’s lifestyle 鈥 and the evolution of modern wolves. The animal is the oldest ancient wolf on record.
Lead author Professor Julie Meachen, of Des Moines University, Iowa, said: “She’s the most complete wolf mummy that’s ever been found.
“She’s basically 100 per cent intact 鈥 all that’s missing are her eyes.
“And the fact she’s so complete allowed us to do so many lines of inquiry on her to basically reconstruct her life.”
The animal has been named Zhur 鈥 meaning “wolf” in the local indigenous Han language.
By studying hair and tooth chemicals, the researchers found the pup’s mother mainly ate aquatic foods.
That probably meant seasonal consumption of fish from the Klondike River, which still has a modern-day spawning population of Chinook salmon.
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