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There Were Huge Wolf-Sized Otters in China 6 Million Years Ago

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Two Siamogale melilutra individuals, one feeding on a fresh water clam, are pictured in this artist illustration handout image obtained by Reuters January 23, 2017. Scientists have unearthed fossils of an intriguingly large otter as big as a wolf that frolicked in rivers and lakes in a lush, warm and humid wetlands region in southwestern China about 6.2 million years ago. Mauricio AntÛn/Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County/Handout via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS - THIS IMAGE WAS PROVIDED BY A THIRD PARTY. EDITORIAL USE ONLY
An artist's illustration of Siamogale melilutra, an otter as big as a wolf, in a handout image distributed on Jan. 23, 2017.Mauricio Antún—Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County/Reuters
By Julia Zorthian

Scientists have found evidence of a wolf-sized otter relative that lived in southwest China’s wetlands 6 million years ago.

The researchers from China and the U.S. based their findings about the recently-discovered Siamogale melilutra species on a cranium, some teeth and a mandible that they found and digitally reconstructed in a coal mine, the New York Times reports.

“It’s huge, it’s bigger than anything I’ve ever seen in terms of otters,” Denise Su, an author of the report detailing findings about the new species, told the Times.

The skull had been flatted by pressure and time, researchers said, so they had to scan and digitally re-“inflate” the bones. After doing so, they determined the specimen was probably 6-feet long and 110 pounds.

[New York Times]

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Write to Julia Zorthian at julia.zorthian@time.com