Mammoth fossils discovered in N China

Ivory and bone fossils believed to be the fossils of a woolly mammoth have been discovered in a small village in North China's Hebei province, Xinhua News Agency reported Tuesday.

Yang Haiqing, a local farmer from Lijia village of Pingquan county, Hebei province, found the fossils while cleaning his vegetable cellar last week. The findings were later indentified by experts in Beijing as the fossils of a woolly mammoth, a type of extinct animal that lived about 10,000 years to 1.8 million years ago.

The unearthed ivory fragment is about 80 centimeters long and 18 centimeters in diameter and is connected by what looks like the head bone of the mammoth. Most of the fossils were not dug out but kept under the protection of local authorities, Xinhua said.

Experts have yet to determine the age of the fossils, and DNA tests are still underway.