Which Ice Age mammal had long curved tusks and a coat of fur?

The Ice Age mammal with long curved tusks and a coat of fur was the woolly mammoth. Its dense covering combined long outer guard hairs with a shorter, insulating undercoat, helping it survive in the cold grasslands of the mammoth steppe.

Woolly mammoth tusks were modified incisor teeth that grew throughout life. They curved inward and could be used for fighting, moving objects, foraging, and possibly clearing snow to reach vegetation. The animals also had short ears and tails, features that reduced heat loss and the risk of frostbite.

Woolly mammoths were close relatives of living elephants and were roughly similar in size to modern African elephants. They mainly ate grasses and other cold-adapted plants. Frozen carcasses discovered in Siberia and North America have preserved fur, skin, stomach contents, and even dung, making this one of the best-studied extinct mammals.

Mastodons and Stegodon were also elephant relatives, but they were not the classic heavily furred Ice Age mammal described here. “Mammoth” refers to a broader group, while the woolly mammoth is the cold-adapted species most familiar from frozen remains and prehistoric art.