Habitat
The habitat and region where the woolly mammoth lived was called the “mammoth steppe”. It stretched from northern Asia to many parts of Europe and North America, since the continental plates shifted during the ice age and continue to shift, resulting in the area that woolly mammoths inhabited to be split up between continents. Scientists believe the woolly mammoth territory to have been similar to the modern day grassy Russian planes, except that there was more vegetation and grasses, and the herds could come back to different grazing areas sooner, since the flora grew faster.
Diet
Wooly mammoths were herbivorous, and fed on mainly grass, sedges, and shrubs. Diets of woolly mammoths varied depending on location. Like the modern day elephants and many other species, mammoths needed a variety of foods to support their growth. An adult of about six tons would need to eat four hundred pounds of food, and may have foraged for about twenty hours, daily. The two-fingered tip of their trunks were most likely an adapted trait used to pick up short grasses by wrapping their trunk around them. Their trunks could also be used for pulling off large tufts of grass, gently picking flowers and buds, and tearing off leaves and branches from shrubs and trees.
Predators
The only predators of the woolly mammoth were saber toothed cats, and humans. Due to the mammoth’s massive size, the saber tooths only hunted young calves. As elephants do today, woolly mammoths had enormous tusks used for digging and collecting food, but also for intimidation and defense against attackers. Other than human hunters who quickly wiped out vast populations of woolly mammoths in the area of the Arctic Tundra, the rapidly melting ice had an impact on the mammoths’ eventual extinction.