(C) Daily Kos
This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered.
 . . . . . . . . . .



Ancient America: Ice Age mammals (museum exhibit) [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']

Date: 2023-12-17  

One of the exhibits in the Cashmere Museum in Cashmere, Washington features Ice Age Mammals.

The Pleistocene, an era which lasted from about 2.5 million years ago until 11,700 years ago, was an era whose beginning was marked by the growth of ice sheets in the Northern Hemisphere. It was a period of time marked by climatic instability. Paleontologists generally divide the Pleistocene into three periods—Early, Middle, and Late. The Late Pleistocene was characterized by many large mammals, known collectively as megafauna. The climate at this time was cooler and wetter than it is today.

At the end of the Pleistocene nearly 75% of the megafauna (land-based animals over 44 kg) in North America died out. Ian Lange, in his book Ice Age Mammals of North America, writes:

“Extinction—defined as the end of the evolution of a genetically related group of organisms without replacement—has taken place since organisms first inhabited the earth. And extinction is the destiny of all species.”

With regard to the extinctions following the Ice Ages in North America, Ian Lange writes:

“The extinction of Ice Age mega-mammals was massive. North America lost at least thirty-one genera of animals weighing more than 100 pounds (44 kilograms), including several families and the entire elephant order.”

In his book Humans: From the Beginning, Christopher Seddon writes:

“In North America, 33 genera of megafauna went extinct, a loss of 72 percent; and in South America, the losses were even more severe with 50 genera lost, or 83 percent.”

Spearpoints

Since the extinction occurs at about the time there is increasing evidence for modern humans in North America, there are a few people who feel—some quite strongly—that over-hunting led to the extinctions. In 1932, archaeologists working in a site near Clovis, New Mexico, found an ancient stone spearpoint embedded in the rib of a mammoth, thus starting the hypothesis of the Clovis mammoth hunters as the first Americans. In a report in American Archaeology, Tamara Stewart writes:

“Megafauna such as the Columbian mammoth went extinct at about the same time Clovis hunters were becoming established in North America, fueling a debate regarding whether the animals’ extinction was due to human hunting, climate change, or a combination of both.”

Data from the many Clovis sites which have been studied in North America doesn’t really substantiate the idea of Clovis hunters focusing on mammoths: there are only a dozen sites in which Clovis is associated with mammoth remains.

Archaeological data also shows a decline in the megafauna in several areas many centuries before the first human habitation. Christopher Seddon writes:

“Another problem is that some of the extinctions occurred in places where there were no humans. In Alaska, horses declined in size, then in numbers, and finally became extinct—but the extinction occurred some 500 years before the first humans arrived.”

While the over-hunting hypothesis is popular, the archaeological data doesn’t support it. Shown below are some of the stone spearpoints in the Cashmere Museum exhibit.

More Ancient America

Ancient America: The Pleistocene Extinctions

Ancient America: North American Camels

Ancient America: Mastodons (revised)

Ancient America: Mammoths

Ancient America: A very short overview of Clovis

Ancient America: The East Wenatchee Clovis Site (museum tour)

Ancient America: The Richey-Roberts Clovis site (museum diary)

[END]
---
[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/12/17/2211734/-Ancient-America-Ice-Age-mammals-museum-exhibit?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=latest_community&pm_medium=web

Published and (C) by Daily Kos
Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified.

via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds:
gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/