Ancient mastodon tooth found by jogger on California beach

A gigantic tooth that once belonged to an ancient mastodon was discovered, lost and then found again over Memorial Day weekend, after a tourist saw and photographed it on a California beach without realizing what it was.
The tourist, whom officials described as a visitor with ties to the Santa Cruz area, originally spotted the rare fossil at Rio Del Mar beach last Friday. She posted a photo of the tooth, which measured 1 foot long, according to the news station KRON-TV, to social media where it was then recognized by Wayne Thompson, the paleontology collections advisor at the Santa Cruz Museum of Natural History.
"This is (a) ... molar tooth of the Pacific Mastodon Mammut pacificus, and an extremely important find. Give me a call when you get a chance," Thompson wrote in response to her social media post, the museum said in a news release.
Ancient mastodon tooth found by jogger on California beach