Mass Grave May Unlock Secrets of Dodo
Elizabeth Davies
Independent
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The mysterious and long-extinct dodo has fascinated the nature world since it disappeared from the planet in the late 17th century.
And now a newly discovered mass grave, containing remains of the lost creature, could help scientists learn more about the creature.
The cache of bones, and possibly entire dodo skeletons, uncovered by an international team of researchers on a sugar cane plantation in the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius, was hailed as a 
significant boost to modern understanding of the bird, one of the first documented animals to have been made extinct by the actions of human beings."This new find will allow for the first scientific research into, and reconstruction of, the world in which the dodo lived, before Western man landed on Mauritius and wiped out the species," the researchers said.
Kenneth Rijsdijk, a geologist with the Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research, who led the dig, said:
"We have found 700 bones including bones from 20 dodo birds and chicks but we believe there are many more at the site."
The remains, thought to date back 2,500 years to when the dodo lived without human interference, should yield valuable DNA samples, scientists presenting the findings at the Dutch National Museum of Natural History said.
The find has also alerted researchers to the potential treasures which could lurk beneath the surface of the Mare aux Songes, the low-lying swamp area in the south-eastern part of Mauritius where the fossil material was discovered.
Dec 24, 2005
Elizabeth Davies Independent
__________
The mysterious and long-extinct dodo has fascinated the nature world since it disappeared from the planet in the late 17th century.
And now a newly discovered mass grave, containing remains of the lost creature, could help scientists learn more about the creature.
The cache of bones, and possibly entire dodo skeletons, uncovered by an international team of researchers on a sugar cane plantation in the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius, was hailed as a
significant boost to modern understanding of the bird, one of the first documented animals to have been made extinct by the actions of human beings."This new find will allow for the first scientific research into, and reconstruction of, the world in which the dodo lived, before Western man landed on Mauritius and wiped out the species," the researchers said.Kenneth Rijsdijk, a geologist with the Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research, who led the dig, said:
"We have found 700 bones including bones from 20 dodo birds and chicks but we believe there are many more at the site."
The remains, thought to date back 2,500 years to when the dodo lived without human interference, should yield valuable DNA samples, scientists presenting the findings at the Dutch National Museum of Natural History said.
The find has also alerted researchers to the potential treasures which could lurk beneath the surface of the Mare aux Songes, the low-lying swamp area in the south-eastern part of Mauritius where the fossil material was discovered.
Dec 24, 2005
