A huge shell semi-submerged in a mud puddle has been discovered by chance in a stream next to a farm in Carlos Spegazzini, about 40 kilometers south of Buenos Aires (Argentina). Experts have agreed that it is a practically complete shell and in an excellent state (it is almost intact) of a glyptodon , a prehistoric mammal that lived 10,000 years ago.
The piece, found one meter deep by masons who were digging to build a house in the area, is two meters in diameter and, according to the first observations of scientists, corresponds to a young glyptodon.
This ancestor of modern armadillos could weigh up to a ton, weigh about 1.4 tons and was a native of South America. Despite their ostentatious build, glyptodonts were herbivores and defended themselves from predators with their rigid shell as an impenetrable shield.
They became extinct in the Quaternary period, approximately 10,000 years ago, so this fossil would represent one of the last specimens of the glyptodonts that coexisted with the first settlers of America , since they became extinct in an event known as the Extinction of the Megafauna. in the Quaternary.
