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Natural History: Woolly and Columbian Mammoths Interbred, Upending Our Understanding of Ice Age Giants
26 September 2025
By James Hamilton
By James Hamilton
Woolly mammoth © Shutterstock
New research reveals that woolly mammoths and Columbian mammoths didn’t just coexist - they repeatedly interbred in North America, rewriting the story of how these Ice Age giants adapted to changing climates.
For decades, scientists assumed the two species lived mostly separate lives. Woolly mammoths roamed cold, grassy regions of today’s Canada and northern U.S., while Columbian mammoths preferred warmer southern areas. But genetic analysis of two mammoth teeth from British Columbia shows the two species were far more intertwined than previously thought.
An international team - including Professor Adrian Lister from London’s Natural History Museum and researchers from Sweden’s Centre for Palaeogenetics - found clear evidence of long-term hybridisation. “Hybridisation has been a major driver of evolution,” said Prof. Lister. “It challenges the old idea of a simple, branching evolutionary tree - sometimes, evolution is more like a network.”
The study, published in Biology Letters, shows that woolly mammoths moved south during glacial periods, meeting and breeding with Columbian mammoths multiple times over thousands of years. DNA from one of the fossils even carried more Columbian mammoth genes than the other, proving repeated interbreeding.
This isn’t the first time scientists have seen mammoth mixing. A 2021 study found that Columbian mammoths themselves originated from woolly mammoths mating with steppe mammoths in Siberia more than a million years ago. After crossing the land bridge from Siberia to Alaska, both species continued to swap genes in North America, meaning up to half of Columbian mammoth DNA came from woolly mammoths, wand some woolly mammoths also inherited Columbian genes.
The researchers combined genetic and physical analysis to paint a fuller picture of mammoth evolution. Interestingly, hybrid mammoths’ teeth were very similar to woolly mammoths’, perfectly adapted for grazing tough grasses. In the south, hybrid Columbian mammoths retained more generalist teeth despite carrying significant woolly mammoth DNA.
Studying these ancient adaptations could offer lessons for modern species facing climate change. “Understanding how animals cope with environmental shifts is vital today,” Prof. Lister said. “Mammoths didn’t survive the Ice Age, but their story can help us understand why, and what it might mean for elephants and other animals now.”
The research reflects the Natural History Museum’s work in Evolution of Life and Genomics, exploring how evolution and environmental change shape life on Earth.
One of the mammoth molars studied. Credit: Laura Termes, Simon Fraser University in Canada
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