Gold Rush Fans Are Skeptical About The Mammoth Tusk Discovery In Season 13
Discovery's "Gold Rush" series caught woolly mammoth fever this week thanks to a massive new "find" in one of Tony Beets' dig sites. According to local experts, the Alaskan gold miner managed to unearth some woolly mammoth bones and a large tusk from a spot at the show's Paradise Hill site. But many "Gold Rush" fans aren't buying it.
When Beets supposedly finds the woolly mammoth tusk in Episode 17 of "Gold Rush," titled "Mammoth Mess," the piece of paleontological history can be seen sticking out of the side of an excavated site at Paradise Hill (via YouTube). "Tusks is not that big of a discovery," Beets says after the find, trying to downplay its significance. "But if there is something attached to it that's a whole different story."
It turned out that there were in fact bones surrounding the alleged tusk, which were later deemed to be from a woolly mammoth. However, "Gold Rush" fans find the circumstances surrounding the alleged uncovering extremely suspicious.
Gold Rush viewers think the tusk discovery was staged
While it sounds believable for Tony Beets to stumble upon a woolly mammoth tusk and bones in Alaska's Yukon region, there are just too many weird circumstances surrounding the alleged find for "Gold Rush" fans to believe it's not staged.
For one, the discovery comes less than a year after a mummified baby woolly mammoth was found by miners in Canada's nearby Klondike gold fields (via CNN). The find was first reported in June 2022, and similar discoveries have been happening all over the region in recent years due to a reported thawing of the Arctic permafrost (via Wired). Secondly, the tusk looked in way too good of shape — as did the surrounding area — for it to have been lodged in the side of a gold dig the way it was.
"Gold Rush mine site 'discovers' a tusk two months after a highly publicized discovery 40 miles away two months earlier," said Redditor u/SufficientlySober in an Episode 17 discussion thread. "Also pretty amazing the tip was undisturbed having been unearthed by an excavator," the user added. "Things that make you go hmmm."
Redditor u/mrcrashoverride added, "Tusk super cool, Tony bringing in experts very impressive....The fact that the Tusk being found so high up on the side of a VERY HUGE cut putting a stop to mining...not believable." However, as mentioned earlier, it's important to remember that finding mammoth tusks in random parts of the Yukon region is not far-fetched at all, with "Gold Rush" star Parker Schnabel also making the strange find once. So to think Beets could have found some during an episode isn't actually as crazy as it sounds, despite what people are saying.