Saber-tooth tiger fossil found in Mississippi creek bed

A Mississippi man recently dug up the fossilized remains of a saber-toothed tiger.

According to an article in the Clarion Ledger newspaper in Jackson, Eddie Templeton of Madison recently discovered the fossilized toe bone of the cat while hunting for fossils in a creek bed in Yazoo County.

The species has been identified as smilodon fatalis by the Mississippi Museum of Natural Science.

Smilodon fatalis, are a species of large cat that weighed between 350 and 620 pounds. They died out about 10,000 years ago, at the end of the Pleistocene Era.

Officials from the Mississippi Museum of Natural Science say Tempelton’s find is a rare one. According to state paleontologist George Phillips of the Mississippi Museum of Natural Science, who identified it, there are fewer than six fossilized bones of saber-toothed cats in the museum collection.