VERNAL, Utah — Researchers with the Utah Division of State Parks and the USDA Forest Service Ashley National Forest say they have discovered a nearly complete skeleton of a red fox dating back to the Ice Ages. The body was found in a cave in the Uinta Mountains of northeastern Utah.
The team says they used a radiocarbon age on one of the bones when it was first discovered several years ago which indicate the skeleton is approximately 26,000 years old. That would date it from just before the last glacial maximum during the Ice Ages. That means the skeleton was lying there for more than 10,000 years when humans first started farming founder crops and more than 20,000 years when the Giza pyramids were built.
“It was a gorgeous specimen,” said the Utah Field House of Natural History State Park Museum’s John Foster, who was the project's lead organizer. “Almost the entire animal lying where it had been for so long, nearly every bone intact and well preserved. We don’t often see specimens like that.”
Red foxes are the most widely distributed terrestrial carnivores in the world. The team of researchers say they appeared in North America from Eurasia between 300,000 and 130,000 years ago.
The nearly complete skeleton, which has been nicknamed "Roxy," was found in a less accessible part of the cave. The name was chosen following a poll at the museum.
“This specimen is one of the oldest directly dated records of the red fox species,” said Ice Age mammal expert Greg McDonald, a retired National Park Service paleontologist. “The first in Utah, but among the oldest in North America.”
“Perhaps the most common question is how the red fox got nearly half a mile into the back of the cave in complete darkness,” said Ashley National Forest geologist David Herron, who helped plan and lead the expedition.
The skeleton was originally found several years ago but wasn't collected due to the difficulty of getting the fragile bones out of the cave and down the mountain. But following additional planning the team decided to go in this past summer.
The team used plastic tubes that were specially made to pack out the bones without them getting damaged. Before any were removed the team also photo-documented where they were in the cave.
“Getting the supplies and gear through the cave to the canid proved to be a challenge, and getting back out with the skeleton went only a little smoother,” Foster said. “We were in the cave for about six hours.”
In all the entire expedition took the team of nine nearly 16 hours to complete.
Before Roxy was discovered, few Ice Age mammals had been found in northeastern Utah. One example is the shin bone of a camel found in the 1980's south of Vernal. Researchers say Roxy's skeleton is one of the most significant finds of an Ice Age animal in the region.
Following testing, cleaning, and stabilizing, some of Roxy's bones will be displayed at the Utah Field House of Natural History State Park Museum in Vernal, Utah. “Roxy has finally seen the light of day again after 26,000 years in total darkness,” Foster said. “We look forward to sharing her with visitors soon."
