Paleontologists confirmed this week that the discovery, in Washtenaw County's Lima Township, was indeed "out of the norm." Tusks when found are usually very friable so that the layers of ivory split and break off in small pieces. Two years ago, James Bristle, a Michigan soybean farmer, found the bones of a woolly-Columbian mammoth hybrid while installing a drainage system on one of his fields. Fisher excavated the bones, including a skull complete with tusks. The "fence post" Bristle found turned out to be a part of a skeleton of a woolly mammoth that roamed the Earth between 10,000 and 15,000 years ago. Farmers digging a soy field near Chelsea, Michigan, were surprised to uncover the bones of a woolly mammoth that trod the region about 12,000 years ago. Daniel Fisher, a professor at the University of Michigan and director and curator at the university's Museum of Paleontology, told CBS Detroit that he knew exactly what it … University of Michigan professor Dan Fisher and a team of Michigan students work to excavate a woolly mammoth found on a farm in Lima Township on Thursday, October 1, 2015. Well-preserved tusks of mastodons or mammoths have not been found in Michigan. One of the differences between the American mastodon and the mammoth is the way the tusks leave the skull. University of Michigan professor Dan Fisher and a team of Michigan students work to excavate a woolly mammoth found on a farm in Lima Township on Thursday, October 1, 2015. Farmer finds 15,000-year-old woolly mammoth remains in Michigan field This article is more than 4 years old. A Michigan farmer was digging in a field when he discovered the bones of an 11,000-year-old wooly mammoth. A mammoth skull and tusks are lifted from the ground at a farm southwest of Ann Arbor, at an unincorporated site in Washtenaw County, Michigan. Instead it turned out to be about 20 percent of a woolly mammoth, including the skull, jaw, vertebrae and ribs, that died between 11,000 and 15,000 years ago. But they’re usually mastodons . Two farmers in Michigan made an astonishing discovery when they unearthed the remains of a woolly mammoth while digging in a soybean field. It’s a bit more unusual to find a mammoth , the group more closely related to modern elephants. Along with the mammoth, they found three very large boulders, which has led Fisher and other experts to believe the mammoth was butchered and brought to this area, which probably once held a pond. The mammoth would have lived around 15,000 years ago according to Fisher. Michigan Farmer Digs Up Woolly Mammoth Bones in Field A Michigan farmer reaped a startling harvest last week when he unearthed the partial skeleton of a prehistoric mammoth …