Article: Odontoma in a northern mammoth

A fossil odontoma presumably derived from Mammuthus primigenius has been collected from late Pleistocene deposits in the Yukon Territory, Canada. Odontomas are not as commonly recognized as some other pathological conditions in extinct vertebrates, but the majority of undoubted cases reported are from Pleistocene proboscideans of North America and Asia. Some reports in other mammalian orders from other regions may be questioned. Owing to a very inadequate record no correlations can yet be shown between the incidence of odontoma and possible environmental causative factors, either in living or extinct vertebrates. The distribution of odontomas in living animals (mammals and teleost fishes) suggests that the lesions probably occur more often in the fossil record than existing reports suggest.