Folks have been all a-twitter about the giant fossil rabbit found on the Spanish isle of Minorca during the past week, but there was another oversized mammal announced in the same issue of the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology that has so far gone unnoticed. About the same age as the behemoth bunny, this other giant lived alongside some of our own close relatives in northeastern Africa. If the suggestions of the scientists who discovered it are correct, this creature might best be described as the “bear otter.”

The bones of the enormous otter were found in the 3.2 – 3.4 million year old deposits of Dikika in Ethiopia’s Afar Valley. Among paleontologists, this area is best known for