Mammoths and mastodons, both ancient relatives of elephants, were driven to extinction by climate change rather than mass hunting by humans, new research published in the journal Nature Ecology & Evolution suggests.
The study questions claims that the first human hunters wiped out these animals and blames extreme global environmental change at the end of the last Ice Age for the species’ decline and eventual elimination.
“Our data refutes some recent claims about the role of archaic humans in eliminating prehistoric elephants, since big game hunting became a crucial part of our ancestors’ livelihood strategy around 1.5 million ago. of years. This is not to say that we have conclusively refuted any human involvement, “explains Zhang Hanwen, co-author of the study from the University of Bristol.
Thus , the decline of mammoths and mastodons in Africa would have already started long before modern humans reached Eurasia some 185,000 years ago, due to habitat changes that were relentless; they were in a constantly changing global climate and proboscides that could not adapt eventually became extinct.
Although today’s elephants are restricted to just three endangered species in the African and Asian tropics, these are survivors of a once more diverse and widespread group of giant herbivores, known as proboscidia, which also include the now-extinct mastodons. , stegodons and deinoterides.
Referencia: “The rise and fall of proboscidean ecological diversity” by Juan L. Cantalapiedra, Óscar Sanisidro, Hanwen Zhang, María T. Alberdi, José L. Prado, Fernando Blanco and Juha Saarinen, 1 July 2021, Nature Ecology & Evolution.
DOI: 10.1038/s41559-021-01498-w
