Plumber Makes Mammoth Find

PERRIS, Calif. -- A part-time plumber who regularly prowls a Riverside County riverbed found what is believed to be the 4-foot-long tusk of an Ice Age mammoth or mastodon.

Experts say the tusk could date back 16,000 to 2 million years.

Greg Riecke discovered the tusk in the flood channel behind his Perris home about 60 miles southeast of Los Angeles. He regularly explores the riverbed with a metal detector in a hunt for gold.

The fate of the fossil is now in the hands of the county Flood Control and Water Conservation District, which owns the drainage channel. The tusk has been covered up again with dirt.

Western Center for Archaeology and Paleontology experts say their museum or another organization will likely be interested in surveying the site.

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