Scientists extracted volcanic rocks that formed the ancient lake. In 2001, a hole was drilled into the center of the Messel Pit. Lower to the ground, she encountered the toxic gas in Messel Lake, lost consciousness, and drowned. Her broken wrist meant she couldn’t leap and cling to high tree branches. Scientists speculate this is what killed Ida. The pure CO2 travels up from the lake and can kill any living creature that breathes in the gas. Maars have volcanoes under them, and from time to time they emit carbon dioxide gas. Another characteristic of maars is that they sometimes spit out toxic gas. They didn’t go through the same decomposition process that other living things do when they die. Anything that fell into the lake was remarkably well-preserved. Because the maar had no rivers running into or out of it, the water at the bottom of the lake received very little oxygen. The explosion that formed Messel Lake happened about 50 million years ago, during the early Middle Eocene epoch. The explosion created a type of volcanic lake known as a maar. The pressure of the steam caused a massive explosion as it tore into the earth. When the magma hit the water table, it instantly turned to steam. The pit was formed millions of years ago when hot magma bubbling from under the earth came too close to the underground water table. The Messel Pit is an abandoned quarry about 35 kilometers (22 miles) southeast of Frankfurt, Germany, near the village of Messel. The species name, masillae, commemorates the Messel Pit in Germany, where Ida was found. The genus Darwinius was named in honor of Charles Darwin's 200th birthday. Darwinius masillae Ida's scientific name is Darwinius masillae. They decided to name the fossil after her. Developmentally, she was about the same age as Hurum’s daughter, Ida, who was also losing her baby teeth. From this evidence, the paleontologists determined Ida was a juvenile primate-not a baby, but not fully adult, either. Unerupted molars-adult teeth that were pushing out her baby teeth-could still be seen in her jaw. When the scientists looked closer, they discovered Ida was in the process of losing her baby teeth. One of the discoveries Hurum and other paleontologists made when they x-rayed Ida was that she had many more teeth than the average primate. The identity of the person who dug up Ida remains unknown. The main part (“Slab A”) remained with the collector, while the other part ("Slab B") was sold to the Wyoming Dinosaur Center in Thermopolis, Wyoming, in the United States. Until 2000, Ida's remains were split into two pieces. A private collector discovered Ida near Messel, Germany, in 1983. Hurum persuaded the museum to purchase Ida. Jørn Hurum, a paleontologist at the Natural History Museum in Oslo, Norway. The scientific team that introduced Ida to the world was led by Dr. Rounded fingertips with nails are classic primate features.
Her hands show she had rounded fingertips with nails, not claws. Ida had long fingers and toes and opposable thumbs. Her last meal- fruit-was still preserved in her gut millions of years after she ate it. However, scientists didn’t have to guess what she ate. The shape of Ida’s teeth suggests she was a vegetarian. Nocturnal animals are active mainly at night. Ida had large eye sockets, which suggest she was nocturnal. She didn’t die of a broken wrist, but it almost certainly contributed to her early death.
Ida’s remains also show she had a broken right wrist. Ida's legs were longer than her arms, indicating she was a le aper. Her body is 24 centimeters (nine inches) long. From end to end she is only 58 centimeters (23 inches) long, about the size of a small house cat. Ida was a small primate, about nine months old when she died. By comparison, the famous “ Lucy” fossil, from the species Australopithecus afarensis, is only 40 percent complete. Ninety-five percent complete, she is the most complete primate fossil ever found. Paleontologists, scientists who study fossils, estimate that Ida died 47 million years ago. Ida (pronounced EE-duh) is the most perfectly preserved primate fossil in the world.
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