30 million years ago, Antarctica drifted over the south pole and ice began to cover it, while India hit Asia to make the Himalayan Mountains.
Perhaps these were the events which started the climate on its long downward drift towards the ice age.We do not really know what causes an ice age. By 25 million years ago much of the Earth was too cool and dry for trees and many forests were replaced by grassland.
Mammals evolved which could live on the ice. Woolly mammoth and other cold-loving mammals spread over northern lands.
There were several interglacials within this ice age, like the one we are living through now. Most of the ice melted about 11 thousand years ago, starting this interglacial. The climate reached its warmest about 5000 years ago, when it was much warmer than today. Since then (except for a recent warming probably due to human produced greenhouse gases) the weather has been getting colder. |

30 million years ago, Antarctica drifted over the south pole and ice began to cover it, while India hit Asia to make the Himalayan Mountains.