Mastodon Mastodon Mastodons (Greek: μαστός "breast" and ὀδούς, "tooth") are any species of extinct proboscideans in the genus Mammut (family Mammutidae), distantly related to elephants, that inhabited North and Central America during the late Miocene or late Pliocene up to their extinction at the end of the Pleistocene 10,000 to 11,000 years ago. Mastodons lived in herds and were predominantly forest dwelling animals that fed on a mixed diet obtained by browsing and grazing with a seasonal preference for browsing, similar to living elephants. "M. americanum", the American mastodon, is the youngest and best-known species of the genus. They disappeared from
The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History naturally found in Panama. This left a puzzling question: how did the fungus get to Panama? Evidence indicates that humans were instrumental in how the fungus traveled. Kolbert uses the frog-fungus relationship as a symbol of how humans are introducing invasive species to various environments, where native species would normally have the proper distribution of alleles for their environment. Kolbert explains how fossils of the American mastodon ("Mammut americanum") shaped Georges Cuvier's views on catastrophism. According to Cuvier, there was no reason the mastodon should have died out. The mastodon was large enough to avoid predation, had large enough teeth