Deep in the redwood forests of Pleistocene North America roams a bull specimen of Mammut americanum, or the American mastodon. Although often confused with its iconic contemporary the woolly mammoth, the mastodon was in fact a distant relative whose distinctive dentition were adapted to feeding on leaves (whereas mammoths would have preferred grasses). Therefore, mastodons would have preferred wooded habitats instead of the open plains or tundra favored by mammoths. However, both mastodons and mammoths shared a common fate of extinction at the end of the Pleistocene Epoch around 11,000 years ago.