Michigan man unearths 10,000-year-old mastodon bones in backyard

When Daniel LaPoint Jr. started contract work on his neighbor's backyard, he was shocked to discover what he believed were dinosaur bones buried in the dirt.

After contacting experts about the find, LaPoint learned that the 42 bones weren't from a dinosaur, but an Ice Age mastodon. Mastodons, distant relatives of elephants, lived more than 10,000 years ago and weighed up to five tons.

LaPoint and his neighbor Eric Witzke unearthed the four-foot skeleton, which included rib, leg, shoulder and hip bones, as well as tusk fragments and pieces of the animal's vertebrae. LaPoint and Witzke plan to keep a few of the bones themselves and will donate rest of the skeleton to the University of Michigan Museum of Paleontology.

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David Fisher, the museum's director,told the Lansing State Journal that there have been about 330 mastodon bone discoveries in Michigan, but only two of them have occurred within the last year. He estimates the bones are between 10,000 and 14,000 years old and are worth thousands of dollars.