Megafauna extintion

SUMMARY: Chapter 6, in Renfrew & Bahn's textbook (Archaeology: Theories, Methods, and Practice), covers past environments, including looking at past global environment (e.g., winds; coastlines), past landscapes (e.g., glaciers; rivers; buried/submerged landscapes), past plant environments, past animal environments, and past human environments.  In my view, this is one of the best college textbooks available, and is invaluable for students, archaeologists, and the public in general, to obtain a top notch overview of approaching and interpreting the archaeological record. REVISED: May 2023.

Species interactions form food webs, impacting community structure and, potentially, ecological dynamics. It is likely that global climatic perturbations that occur over long periods of time have a significant influence on species interaction patterns. Here, we integrate stable isotope analysis and network theory to reconstruct patterns of trophic interactions for six independent mammalian communities that inhabited mammoth steppe environments spanning western Europe to eastern Alaska (Beringia) during the Late Pleistocene. We use a Bayesian mixing model to quantify the contribution of prey to the diets of local predators, and assess how the structure of trophic interactions changed across space and the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM), a global climatic event that severely impacted mammoth steppe communities. We find that large felids had diets that were more constrained than those of co-occurring predators, and largely influenced by an increase in Rangifer abundance after the LGM. Moreover, the structural organization of Beringian and European communities strongly differed: compared with Europe, species interactions in Beringian communities before—and possibly after—the LGM were highly modular. We suggest that this difference in modularity may have been driven by the geographical insularity of Beringian communities.

How can historical examination of the Pleistocene extinction question in Australia shed light on ways that scientific debate is influenced by the cultures of science and extra-scientific concerns? In Europe, investigation of the antiquity of man occurred against the background of the invention of glaciology and its incorporation into Charles Lyell’s gradualist paradigm, and speculation about fossil fauna. Broadly speaking, these three elements define the terms of a debate that continues today: climatic versus human causes for Pleistocene megafaunal extinction. This paper briefly considers four case studies which illuminate the often contingent nature of scientific knowledge. From nineteenth-century London to 1880s Adelaide to Melbourne in the first decade of the twentieth century to Australian Quaternists in the twenty-first, acceptance or otherwise of Aboriginal testimony and other more material evidence has been conditioned by scientific or political agenda as much as by its intrinsic reliability. These arguments are won in public forums by the weight of rhetoric more than the weight of evidence, perhaps one reason that less deterministic, multi-causal models are rarely debated in the popular media.

Key words: extinction, debate, knowledge, Australia, megafauna.

Diprotodon Owen, was one of the first fossil mammals described from Australia and has the distinction of being the largest ever marsupial. However, until recently its taxonomy was unclear and knowledge of its continental distribution, palaeoecology and evolution was poorly known. This paper describes cranial elements from an unusually small-bodied Diprotodon from the Early Pleistocene Nelson Bay Formation, Portland, Australia. It is intermediate in size between the smaller-bodied Pliocene ancestor, Euryzygoma dunense de Vis 1895 and the larger-bodied Late Pleistocene D. optatum Owen, . However, it is morphologically inseparable from Late Pleistocene Diprotodon and is here referred to as D. ?optatum. A temporal morphocline most parsimoniously explains the medium body size of the Nelson Bay taxon; thus we provide the first evidence of a transitional form within Diprotodon. The cause(s) of gigantism of the E. dunense-D. ?optatum-D. optatum lineage through the late Cainozoic is unclear but most likely involved the physiological response to changes in the physical and/or biotic environment. Although the size changes within the lineage may have been initially advantageous, they were most likely disadvantageous when the optimum body size was obtained. Our results suggest that Diprotodon was at its largest ever body size during the Late Pleistocene - the time period that coincided with its extinction.

The purpose behind this thesis is to examine the presentation of gorillas in disciplines, such as photography, film and literature that have the power to evoke emotion and influence human perceptions of gorillas. It is also to determine how effectual these written or visual narratives can be in their description of an animal few of us will ever come across in person: How true is it that gorillas are fierce? How true is it that they are gentle? Where do these contradictory perceptions come from? How persuasive are photographs, films and books about gorillas in making us believe one thing over another? The visual and written narratives considered in this thesis are both works of fiction, such as jungle films and, especially, King Kong as well as scientific references to real-life events, such as those documented by Dian Fossey in her memoirs. The more well-known references, for example to King Kong and the life of Dian Fossey, are anchored by wider concerns about aged myth and lingering false beliefs that emerged from older narratives about gorillas. This thesis is also concerned with more contemporary questions about the motivation behind widespread compassion for animals that is spurred on by stories told often about favoured species like gorillas, or halted by stories not often told about less favoured species.

The lion (Panthera leo) can rightly claim to be the most oft-invoked animal in all of human culture. Whether praising someone as leonine or lion-hearted, or throwing them to the lions, the second largest of felines has the ability to evoke emotions that the tiger (Panthera tigris), leopard (Panthera pardus) and jaguar (Panthera onca) simply do not. This entwined history stretches at least as far back as the late Pleistocene (100,000 to 10,000 years ago) and possibly as far back as the late Pliocene (about 3.5mya), when the lion lineage first split from the other pantherine cats. We tend to think of the lion as a quintessentially African animal and, indeed, this is where the vast majority of lions survive today. However, the tiny enclave....

The modern Australian koala (Phascolarctos cinereus) is commonly regarded as a dwarf descendent of a Late Pleistocene giant koala (Ph. stirtoni). The implication of that hypothesis is that the giant koala survived the Late Pleistocene megafaunal extinction ‘‘event’’, albeit as a smaller body-sized form. It is important to be able to constrain rates of Late Pleistocene faunal turnover, an aspect reliant on having accurate taxonomic information of extinct species. The koala dwarfing hypothesis is tested here by using a temporally-constrained biogeographical record of fossil koalas, and a morphological character analysis. The contemporary occurrence of both taxa in pre-Late Pleistocene deposits and significant differences in dental morphologies between those forms suggests that the modern koala is not a derived dwarf of the Pleistocene giant koala. Thus, the giant-form was among a number of other giant mammals, lizards and birds that suffered extinction sometime during the Late Pleistocene. The potential phenomenon of dwarfing of other Late Pleistocene and Recent faunas, such as grey kangaroos, is commonly used as a test for or against various megafaunal extinction hypotheses. However, the results of this study also demonstrate that the dwarfing hypothesis has not been adequately tested for a suite of other taxa. Thus, until the dwarfing hypothesis can be more fully tested, a clear understanding of the fate of Late Pleistocene faunas that apparently survived the extinction ‘‘event’’, and the origins of many extant forms will remain elusive.

Understanding the cause of late Quaternary mammal extinctions is the subject of intense debate spanning the fields of archeology and paleontology. In the global context, the losses on continental Africa have received little attention and are poorly understood. This study aims to inspire new discussion of African extinctions through a review of the extinct species and the chronology and possible causes of those extinctions. There are at least 24 large mammal (N5 kg) species known to have disappeared from continental Africa during the late Pleistocene or Holocene, indicating a much greater taxonomic breadth than previously recognized. Among the better sampled taxa, these losses are restricted to the terminal Pleistocene and early Holocene, between 13,000 and 6000 yrs ago. The African extinctions preferentially affected species that are grazers or prefer grasslands. Where good terrestrial paleoenvironmental records are present, extinctions are associated with changes in the availability, productivity, or structure of grassland habitats, suggesting that environmental changes played a decisive role in the losses. In the broader evolutionary context, these extinctions represent recent examples of selective taxonomic winnowing characterized by the loss of grassland specialists and the establishment of large mammal communities composed of more ecologically flexible taxa over the last million years. There is little reason to believe that humans played an important role in African extinctions.

Isotopic tracking of carnivore palaeoecology is a relatively new approach that yielded important results for the study of the non-analogue mammoth steppe biome. After describing the prerequisite to apply this approach and the possible complications, the main achievements will be described for extinct carnivore species such as scimitar-tooth cat Homotherium serum, cave lion Panthera spelaea, giant short-faced bear Arctodus simus, cave bear Ursus spelaeus s.l., as well as for ancient representatives of extant species such as brown bear Ursus arctos and wolf Canis lupus. Isotopic tracking showed that scimitar-tooth cats in Alaska were not a specialist proboscidean predators but rather generalist consumers of other large herbivores. The majority of cave lions analyzed so far were focused on reindeer, some individuals were specialized on cave bears, especially in contexts of competition with cave hyenas. Giant short-faced bears in Alaska were not pure herbivores and consumed meat from reindeer, muskoxen and possibly other predators, but may have still incorporated plant resources in their menu. In contrast, all cave bear populations studied so far for which a clear dietary reconstruction could be done were virtually pure herbivores, only a few cases are still unclear. Interestingly, brown bears used the opposite extreme of the dietary spectrum when competing with other large bears such as cave bears and giant short-faced bears, i.e. were more carnivorous in Europe and more herbivorous in Alaska. Finally wolves seem to have been outcompeted by hyenas but became dominant predators during the Lateglacial in Europe to the expense of the last cave lions. The results obtained through this approach are also relevant for improving conservation strategies of endangered extant large carnivores.

The author presents an exciting new hypothesis for megafauna extinction based upon historical, mythical, geological, astronomic, and atmospheric evidence. While not conclusive, it is highly compelling and demands further investigation. Examples of cross cultural motifs in the form of glyphs, mounds, and earthworks are provided with mythic comparisons and contrasts. Counter arguments are provided throughout as well as strong debunking of prior archaeological biases rooted in Victorian, antiquated pseudoscience. Assumptions in the two models presented for plasma-arc-discharge mechanism are clearly listed, as well as known facts. Citations enable cross reference while the work focuses not on diffusion anthropology, but realistic atmospheric/astronomical plasmoid petroglyph formations recorded in rock

Over 60 faunal species disappeared from the Australian continent during the Middle-Late Pleistocene. Most of these animals were large to gigantic marsupials, birds and reptiles. A terminal extinction date of 46.4 kyr has been proposed for the megafauna, with all sites containing younger fossil megafauna dismissed by some researchers because of questions over stratigraphic integrity or chronologies. The timing of the extinctions is argued to be broadly coincident with estimates of first colonization of the continent by modern humans, and explanatory extinction models involving humans have subsequently gained currency. However there is considerable evidence to suggest that in some parts of the continent, people and some species of megafauna may have co-existed well beyond 46.4 kyr. In other places, such as Tasmania and the north of the continent, there is no known record of a human-megafauna temporal overlap. A review of the available evidence indicates that only 13 species of megafauna were extant on human arrival in Australia. The archaeology of this period indicates that rather than a focus on big game hunting or 'firestick farming', it was characterized by regional variability in subsistence strategies consistent with the range of environmental zones. At the present time there is no substantive argument for a terminal extinction date of 46.4 kyr, the current evidence indicating that there is no specific time period that correlates to any single mass extinction event. On the basis of available evidence arguments for either human or climatic causation are entirely circumstantial and implicitly require acceptance of many unproven assumptions. Claims to have eliminated climate as a primary driver are premature and the recent focus on delivering 'proof' of human causation in Pleistocene faunal extinctions diverts attention from achieving a better understanding of the differential impacts of climate change and short term climatic flux in a land of environmental extremes.

The Thylacine (Tasmanian Tiger) was thought to be extinct, but many believe that it still survives, both in Tasmania and on the Australian mainland. I discuss the fabled marsupial's chances of survival post introduction of the dingo to the continent, and how the recent bushfires may have further impacted its chances.

The woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius) was an emblematic and key species of the so-called mammoth steppe ecosystem between ca. 110,000 and 12,000 years ago. Its contribution to human subsistence during the Gravettian period as source of raw material was documented in southwestern France and southwestern Germany, with some evidence of active hunting in the latter region. However, decreasing genetic diversity and increasing indications of nutritional stress point to a likely decline of this megaherbivore. The specificity of the ecological niche occupied by the woolly mammoth is clearly reflected by their collagen 13C and 15N abundances (δ13Ccoll and δ15Ncoll), measured on skeletal remains of the typical mammoth steppe. The abundances of carbon-13 in mammoth collagen are comparable to those of other grazers like horse (Equus sp.), while the nitrogen-15 abundances are significantly higher (about 3‰) than in the other herbivores, either horse or reindeer (Rangifer tarandus). During the Aurignacian and Gravettian occupation at Geißenklösterle in the Ach Valley (Germany), the mammoths had the expected stable isotope signature, but the nitrogen-15 of horses showed an unexpected overlap with those of the mammoth. This unusual pattern was already occurring during the Aurignacian, while the oxygen-18 abundances in bone phosphate (δ18Obp) of horse and reindeer were unchanged between Aurignacian and Gravettian periods, which rules out significant change in environmental and climatic conditions. Thus, we hypothesize that during the Aurignacian and Gravettian, the ecological niche of mammoth was intact but not occupied intensively by mammoths due to a decline in their population. This decline could be tentatively explained by human pressure through hunting. In Dordogne (France), decreasing horse and reindeer δ15Ncoll values coeval to decreasing horse δ18Obp values between the Aurignacian and the Early Gravettian periods reflected a clear change in the environment, while no contrast in δ15Ncoll values was observed between the Early and Final Gravettian at the Abri Pataud. The mammoth of Dordogne yielded slightly higher δ15Ncoll values than expected, probably as a consequence of the nursing effect since all the analyzed samples were ivory instead of bone. The direct dating and sulphur-34 measurement on the ivory of the Early Gravettian at Pataud showed that almost all of them were of contemporaneous and local origin. Significant contrasts in δ34Scoll values were found between the Dordogne and the Ach Valley for the same herbivores species, which confirms the potential of sulphur-34 in collagen as a mobility tracker.

The Gravettian site of Předmostí I in the central Moravian Plain has yielded a rich and diverse large mammal fauna dated around 25-27,000 14C years BP (ca. 29,500–31,500 cal BP). This fauna includes numerous carnivores (cave lion, wolf, brown bear, polar fox, wolverine) and herbivores (reindeer, large bovine, red deer, muskox, horse, woolly rhinoceros, woolly mammoth) whose trophic position could be reconstructed using stable isotopic tracking (δ13C, δ15N, δ34S) of bone collagen (n=63). Among large canids, two morphotypes, “Pleistocene wolves” and “Palaeolithic dogs”, were considered, and two human bones attributed to the Gravettian assemblage of Předmostí I were also sampled. The trophic system around the Gravettian settlement of Předmostí I showed the typical niche partitioning among herbivores and carnivores seen in other mammoth-steppe contexts. The contribution of the analyzed prey species to the diet of the predators, including humans, was evaluated using a Bayesian mixing model (SIAR). Lions included great amounts of reindeer/muskox and possibly bison in their diet, while Pleistocene wolves were more focused on horse and possibly mammoth. Strong reliance on mammoth meat was found for the human of the site, similarly to previously analyzed individuals from other Gravettian sites in Moravia. Interestingly, the large canids interpreted as “Palaeolithic dogs” had a high proportion of reindeer/muskox in their diet, while consumption of mammoth would be expected from the availability of this prey especially in case of close interaction with humans. The peculiar isotopic composition of the Palaeolithic dogs of Předmostí I may indicate some control of their dietary intake by Gravettian people, who could have use them more for transportation than hunting purpose.

The scarce horse remains from Paso Otero 5 are assigned to Equus (Amerhippus) neogeus and represent a new locality for it in South America. The faunal association~ of Paso Otero 5 indicate that paleoecological and climatic conditions during the
Pleistocene-Holocene transition were arid. The pollen, silicobioliths and stable isotope records al so indicate that there was a cold pulse during this periodo This site is dated to 14C AMS ca. 10,400 years BP. The archaeological and palaeontological data in the Pampas region and local
evidences of Paso Otero 5 site indicate that a trend toward semiarid or arid conditions prevailed during human colonisation at the end of the Late Pleistocene in this area.

Large herbivores and carnivores (the megafauna) have been in a state of decline and extinction since the Late Pleistocene, both on land and more recently in the oceans. Much has been written on the timing and causes of these declines, but only recently has scientific attention focused on the consequences of these declines for ecosystem function. Here, we review progress in our understanding of how megafauna affect ecosystem physical and trophic structure, species composition, biogeochemistry, and climate, drawing on special features of PNAS and Ecography that have been published as a result of an international workshop on this topic held in Oxford in 2014. Insights emerging from this work have consequences for our understanding of changes in biosphere function since the Late Pleistocene and of the functioning of contemporary ecosystems, as well as offering a rationale and framework for scientifically informed restoration of megafaunal function where possible and appropriate. extinctions | trophic cascades | vegetation structure | biogeochemistry | rewilding

Se ofrece una extensa revisión bibliográfica y hemerográfica de los trabajos paleontológicos realizados en el Valle de Puebla desde principios del siglo xx hasta la actualidad. Se hace especial énfasis en los estudios efectuados por el Proyecto Valsequillo y la Fundación Alemana para la Investigación Científica, dado que estos aportaron las mayores contribuciones al conocimiento de la paleontología del Valle de Puebla. Además, se proporcionan datos inéditos sobre las exploraciones que dieron origen a la colección paleontológica del extinto Museo de Historia Natural de Puebla y se comenta sobre el inicio de las investigaciones actuales y su perspectiva hacia el futuro.

The Pleistocene Megafauna extinctions coincide with the migrations of modern humans into new territories throughout the world. The primary motivations for exterminating the Megafauna would have been to eliminate the threat from the predatory and dangerous Megafauna, to gain control of habitats that had been dominated by the Megafauna, and to replace the Megafauna with animals that were less dangerous to hunt, or to live with. All three of these motivations for exterminating the Megafauna are mentioned in the oral traditions of the Native Americans, which state that their ancient ancestors intentionally exterminated the Megafauna, with the blessings, and the assistance, of their tribal Gods. The Paleo-Indians demonized the Megafauna – as man-eating enemies of the Thunderbirds. Many Native American oral traditions state that humans exterminated the Megafauna.

Koalas (Phascolarctidae) are uncommon elements within the Australian fossil record. The earliest representatives are recorded from late Oligocene rainforest assemblages of central Australia. In contrast, the extant Koala Phascolarctos cinereus Blainville, 1816 (the only surviving member of a once diverse family) is found only in eastern Australian open woodlands. Extinction of koalas from rainforests was previously thought to have occurred after the middle Miocene. Recent systematic cave excavations at Mt. Etna, central eastern Queensland, Australia, have revealed several remarkable new middle Pleistocene vertebrate assemblages that are dominated by rainforest-adapted taxa. Within one of the deposits, we have identified a new, but archaic, genus and species of koala. Invictokoala monticola gen. et sp. nov. shares affinities with the most plesiomorphic member of the family, Madakoala Woodburne et al., 1987 (late Oligocene), but is distinguished by possessing higher-crowned upper molars, with a tricsupate (rather than linear) paraconule on M2 (autapomorphic condition within koalas), closely positioned stylar cusps, and better-developed posterior cingulae. Thus, not only does I. monticola represent a ?holdover? from an Oligocene ancestor, but the Madakoala?Invictokoala stem represents a ?ghost? lineage within the Phascolarctidae, with no representatives known between the late Oligocene and middle Pleistocene. Previously, it was thought that the post-middle Miocene loss of koalas from rainforests may have been a result of a co-evolved dependence of koalas to open eucalypt woodlands, and/or competitive exclusion with koala-like rainforest-adapted ringtail possums. However, the inferred diet of middle Pleistocene I. monticola (i.e. non-Eucalyptus) and coeval occurrence with numerous rainforest-adapted ringtail possums does not support that hypothesis. It appears more likely that koalas had always been closely associated with rainforests, at least until the late Quaternary extinction of I. monticola. Generally, the paucity of rainforest faunal assemblages, and specifically, records of fossil koalas through the late Cenozoic drastically limits our understanding of their evolution.

Merrilees’ seminal theory ‘Man the Destroyer’ was developed using local evidence from the Murchison region in the Mid West. Such concepts cannot be effectively researched without addressing site-specific evidence to support regional models. Many landscapes, specifically within Australia, are the result of complex processes that impact our ability to source archaeological data that support these grand theories. The Murchison is certainly one such region, with intricate alluvial systems that possess discontinuous sedimentary records, influencing our accessibility to archaeological material within it. The megafaunal and artefact discoveries that were used to support Merrilees’ theory are embedded within alluvium of the Murchison that has been collectively named ‘Murchison Cement/s’. The informal application of this term has led to ambiguity regarding which artefacts were extracted from the fossil-bearing stratigraphic unit, now dated to 56 ky BP.
A field trip in May 2013 to the site of Ballinu (Ballinyoo) Springs revealed yet another megafaunal fossil and a possible artefact embedded in deposits in the riverbed. The stratigraphy of this single site provides the foundation for new research, which focuses on contextualising museum artefacts sourced from the Ballinu Springs region from their attached sediment. Detailed sedimentological analysis of this thesis highlights pedogenic and geomorphic features used to identify artefacts that have a conceivable association with megafaunal remains. This information also provides a preliminary insight into the alluvial regimes and deposition events that have altered the archaeological and paleontological record at Ballinu Springs. In providing a new classification of the true ‘Murchison Cement/s’, this study forms the foundation for a much larger research project that addresses the contemporaneity of megafauna and man in the Mid West.

A new middle Pleistocene vertebrate fossil record from eastern Australia, dated by U disequilibrium series, records the first Quaternary record of an Australian tropical rainforest fauna. This exceptionally rich fauna underwent extinction after a long period of relative faunal stability, spanning several glacial cycles, and persisted probably until 280 000 years ago. Some time between 280 000 and 205 000 years ago the rainforest fauna was replaced by a xeric-adapted fauna. Since that time, the xeric-adapted fauna was replaced by a mesic-adapted fauna which was established by the Holocene. This is the first vertebrate faunal evidence in Australia of the middle Pleistocene Mid-Brunhes Climatic Event (MBE), a major climatic reorganisation that led to increased aridity in northern Australia from around 300 000 years ago. Several independent palaeoclimate proxies suggest that the climatic shift to aridity was due to increased climatic variability and weakened northern monsoons, which may be manifested in the extinction of the aseasonal rainforest fauna and its replacement by an arid-adapted fauna. We extend the temporal ranges of several taxa from the Pliocene into the middle Pleistocene. We also reveal a longer palaeobiogeographic connection of rainforest taxa and lineages shared between New Guinea and Australia than was previously thought and show that their extinction on mainland Australia occurred sometime after 280 000 years ago.

For hundreds of millions of years, large vertebrates (megafauna) have inhabited most of the ecosystems on our planet. During the late Quaternary, notably during the Late Pleistocene and the early Holocene, Earth experienced a rapid extinction of large, terrestrial vertebrates. While much attention has been paid to understanding the causes of this massive megafauna extinction, less attention has been given to understanding the impacts of loss of megafauna on other organisms with whom they interacted. In this review, we discuss how the loss of megafauna disrupted and reshaped ecological interactions, and explore the ecological consequences of the ongoing decline of large vertebrates. Numerous late Quaternary extinct species of predators, parasites, commensals and mutualistic partners were associated with megafauna and were probably lost due to their strict dependence upon them (co-extinctions). Moreover, many extant species have megafauna-adapted traits that provided evolutionary benefits under past megafauna-rich conditions, but are now of no or limited use (anachronisms). Morphological evolution and behavioural changes allowed some of these species partially to overcome the absence of megafauna. Although the extinction of megafauna led to a number of co-extinction events, several species that likely co-evolved with megafauna established new interactions with humans and their domestic animals. Species that were highly specialized in interactions with megafauna, such as large predators, specialized parasites, and large commensalists (e.g. scavengers, dung beetles), and could not adapt to new hosts or prey were more likely to die out. Partners that were less megafauna dependent persisted because of behavioural plasticity or by shifting their dependency to humans via domestication, facilitation or pathogen spill-over, or through interactions with domestic megafauna. We argue that the ongoing extinction of the extant megafauna in the Anthropocene will catalyse another wave of co-extinctions due to the enormous diversity of key ecological interactions and functional roles provided by the megafauna.

El Parque Nacional Natural Serranía de los Yariguies es el sistema montañoso que presenta mayor altitud en las estribaciones occidentales de la cordillera Oriental de Colombia, además por las particularidades de su aislamiento y del régimen principal de vientos que lo rigen, se ha convertido orográficamente en un área de especiación.

We present radiometric, palaeoclimatological, palaeoenvironmental and archaeological data for the period 40 000-8000 cal BP in the Jura Mountains (eastern France). These medium-sized mountains culminate at ca 1700 m a.s.l. and are today characterised by a semi-continental climate. During the Last Glacial Maximum, the range supported a local ice cap. While recent data suggest a possible early ice-cap development during MIS 4, the chronology of the regional LGM and following deglaciation has still to be refined. The complete disappearance of the local ice cap at ca 17000-16600 cal BP marked the starting accumulation of sediment archives in the Jurassian lakes and mires, which favoured the reconstruction of past changes in climatic and environmental conditions, in addition to faunal remains found in caves and in archaeological sites. Three main successive stages may be distinguished regarding the history of societies. The first stage at ca 40000-18700 cal BP was characterized by very few archaeological sites with only discontinuous intermittent occupations always located outside the Jura range. The second stage around 18700-11700 cal BP corresponded to an increase in the population density as suggested by an increasing number of archaeological sites and a progressive colonisation of elevated areas of the Jura Mountains. The third stage at ca 11700-8000 cal BP coincided with a reinforcement of settlement in the lowland areas as well as a development of long-term occupations in elevated areas. The millennial-scale GS-1 cold event had a more long-lasting and stronger impact on societies than the 200 year-long 8.2 ka cold event.

In 1983, a five-page article was published in The Florida Anthropologist which reported on a submerged mammoth kill site in the Silver River near Ocala, Florida. This claim was supported by evidence consisting of a projectile point, six direct percussion flakes, and "numerous" pressure flakes found in situ with the remains of three Columbian Mammoths. In addition, three of the mammoth bones exhibited what were interpreted as cut-marks. The Guest Mammoth site was the first professional archaeological investigation on an underwater precontact site in the Americas. At the time of discovery, no locality east of the Mississippi River had yielded convincing evidence of human and megafauna interaction. For these reasons and others, the Guest Mammoth site fell into archaeological limbo. The author directed geoarchaeological investigations at the Guest Mammoth site from 2014 to 2019 to assess the standing hypothesis that the site is an intact Late Pleistocene archaeological locality. This paper evaluates the results of the original site excavations and contributes new geoarchaeological data to determine the Guest Mammoth's place in the North American archaeological record. The data presented here do not support the conclusion that the Guest Mammoth site is an unequivocal Late Pleistocene archaeological locality because the mammoth bone and artifact bearing component is not stratigraphically secure and has limited chronological control. However, the presence of datable Late Pleistocene strata and faunal material along with non-diagnostic artifacts indicate that the Silver River is worthy of further geoarchaeological inquiry for Late Pleistocene archaeological sites.

ABSTRACT The woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius) was an emblematic and key species of the so-called mammoth steppe ecosystem between ca. 110,000 and 12,000 years ago. Its contribution to human subsistence during the Gravettian period as source of raw material was documented in southwestern France and southwestern Germany, with some evidence of active hunting in the latter region. However, decreasing genetic diversity and increasing indications of nutritional stress point to a likely decline of this megaherbivore. The specificity of the ecological niche occupied by the woolly mammoth is clearly reflected by their collagen 13C and 15N abundances (δ13Ccoll and δ15Ncoll), measured on skeletal remains of the typical mammoth steppe. The abundances of carbon-13 in mammoth collagen are comparable to those of other grazers like horse (Equus sp.), while the nitrogen-15 abundances are significantly higher (about 3‰) than in the other herbivores, either horse or reindeer (Rangifer tarandus). During the Aurignacian and Gravettian occupation at Geißenklösterle in the Ach Valley (Germany), the mammoths had the expected stable isotope signature, but the nitrogen-15 of horses showed an unexpected overlap with those of the mammoth. This unusual pattern was already occurring during the Aurignacian, while the oxygen-18 abundances in bone phosphate (δ18Obp) of horse and reindeer were unchanged between Aurignacian and Gravettian periods, which rules out significant change in environmental and climatic conditions. Thus, we hypothesize that during the Aurignacian and Gravettian, the ecological niche of mammoth was intact but not occupied intensively by mammoths due to a decline in their population. This decline could be tentatively explained by human pressure through hunting. In Dordogne (France), decreasing horse and reindeer δ15Ncoll values coeval to decreasing horse δ18Obp values between the Aurignacian and the Early Gravettian periods reflected a clear change in the environment, while no contrast in δ15Ncoll values was observed between the Early and Final Gravettian at the Abri Pataud. The mammoth of Dordogne yielded slightly higher δ15Ncoll values than expected, probably as a consequence of the nursing effect since all the analyzed samples were ivory instead of bone. The direct dating and sulphur-34 measurement on the ivory of the Early Gravettian at Pataud showed that almost all of them were of contemporaneous and local origin. Significant contrasts in δ34Scoll values were found between the Dordogne and the Ach Valley for the same herbivores species, which confirms the potential of sulphur-34 in collagen as a mobility tracker.

Understanding of Late Pleistocene megafaunal extinctions in Australia and New Guinea (Sahul) suffers from a paucity of reliably dated bone deposits. Researchers are divided as to when, and why, large-bodied species became extinct. Critical to these interpretations are so-called ‘late survivors’, megafauna that are thought to have persisted for tens of thousands of years after the arrival of people. While the original dating of most sites with purported late survivors has been shown to have been erroneous or problematic, one site continues to feature: Cloggs Cave. Here we report new results that show that Cloggs Cave’s youngest megafauna were deposited in sediments that date to 44,500-54,160 years ago, more than 10,000 years older than previously thought, bringing them into chronological alignment with the emerging continental pattern of megafaunal extinctions. Our results indicate that the youngest megafauna specimens excavated from Cloggs Cave datedate to well before the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM), and their demise could not have been driven by climate change leading into the LGM, the peak of the last Ice Age.

Cave deposits of infill sediments and associated vertebrate fossils provide a valuable source of information on terrestrial palaeoenvironments, climatic conditions and palaeocommunities. In the deposits of the Naracoorte Caves World Heritage Area, such records span the last 500 ka and are renowned for their rich, diverse vertebrate assemblages. Previous research into the Grant Hall deposit of Victoria Fossil Cave suggested that it may preserve the only peak last interglacial (ca. 125 ka) faunal community within the World Heritage Area. The current work tested this existing model for the age of faunal remains from Grant Hall using multiple techniques. Physical and geochemical properties of the visually homogeneous sediments were analysed at regular intervals through the sequence to establish meaningful stratigraphic divisions and sediment provenance. Optically stimulated luminescence dating of individual quartz grains indicates that sediments accumulated in Grant Hall from 93 ± 8 to 70 ± 5 ka. Minimum ages provided by U/Th dating of fossil teeth (72.3 ± 2.2 to 38.2 ± 0.8 ka) are consistent with the luminescence chronology, and show that the deposit represents a more recent faunal accumulation than previously modelled for the site. U/Th ages on calcite straws within the deposit are significantly older than the sediments and fossil teeth (>500 to 186.4 ± 1 ka). As such they provide no further constraint on the chronology of the deposit but do indicate that speleothem deposition was active over much of the Middle Pleistocene. Sedimentary analyses resulted in the identification of five depositional units, contrasting with previous divisions which were based only on visual observation of the sedimentary sequence. Sediments within each unit are broadly classified as sandy silts with soil structures and may be indirectly derived from the lunettes of nearby Bool Lagoon, although their ultimate provenance is unknown. As a result of this work, palaeoenvironmental reconstruction based on fossil remains in the deposit may be more accurately related to prevailing climatic and environmental conditions at the time of accumulation. It also contributes to an understanding of the temporal occurrence of regional vertebrate faunas through the Late Pleistocene, reinforcing the value of developing stratigraphically constrained chronologies for cave deposits based on multiple techniques.

Samples of cortical bone (about 0.5 g) were collected from specimens of Miracinonyx trumani, Smilodon ensenadensis (=populator) and Homotherium serum from museum collections at the University of Kansas (Lawrence), Zoological Museum Amsterdam and the Canadian Museum of Nature (Ottawa) (Table S5), respectively. DNA extraction, amplification, and sequencing DNA was extracted as previously described [S1] using appropriate ancient DNA techniques [S2] in a dedicated laboratory in the Henry Wellcome Ancient Biomolecules Centre (HWABC), where no other molecular biology work is performed. Primers (Table S1) were designed based on a wide range of representative sequences [S3-S6] obtained from Genbank [S7] or manually transcribed from Masuda et al. [S5]. PCR experiments ( ) were set up in the HWABC and manually transported to the Department of Zoology for thermal cycling and post-PCR procedures. All PCR reactions were conducted as described previously [S1] using Hi-fidelity Platinum Taq (Invitrogen) to minimise polymerase error. PCR cycling involved an initial activation step at 94°C, for 2 min, followed by 40 cycles at 94°C for 45 s, 45 s at the annealing temperature , and 68°C for 1 min 30 s.