The woolly mammoths, which lived from 300,000 to 10,000 years ago, went extinct due to a combination of climate change and human hunting.

Their extinction occurred during the transition from the Ice Age to the interglacial period, with a combination of climate change and human activity likely causing their extinction.

Climate change reduced grassland habitats, which were essential for the survival of woolly mammoths, and this reduction is thought to have contributed to their extinction.

The warming climate caused trees and swamp plants to replace mammoth pastures, leading to a decrease in the population and genetic diversity of woolly mammoths.

Human hunting pressures also played a role in the extinction of woolly mammoths, with evidence suggesting that humans interacted with mammoths for 800 years in Siberia and accumulated mammoth bones for ivory technology.

The archaeological evidence from a site in Austria, where woolly mammoth bones were found, suggests that humans may have hunted and slaughtered woolly mammoths, indicating coordination and planning among Paleolithic people.

The paleontological evidence, including a 'mammoth graveyard' found in East Siberian Arctic with 156 individual mammoths, shows that mammoth populations dwindled due to climate change.

The analysis of DNA of ancient plants and animals from 535 places also supports the idea that climate change was a major driver of woolly mammoth extinction.

However, the exact role of human hunting in the extinction of woolly mammoths is still debated, with some studies suggesting that human predation or scavenging was the most likely cause of bone accumulation.

The combination of climate change and human hunting is thought to have led to the extinction of woolly mammoths around 2000 BC, with their populations restricted to Arctic islands near Siberia and Alaska.

The study of woolly mammoth extinction can provide insights into the impact of climate change and human activity on species survival and the importance of conservation efforts.

The comparison of archaeological and paleontological evidence suggests that both climate-driven and anthropogenic factors contributed to the extinction of woolly mammoths.

The loss of megafauna, including the woolly mammoths, led to a 90% decrease in phosphorus redistribution, highlighting the significant impact of these species on nutrient cycling.

The extinction of megafauna also decreased calcium and magnesium distribution, further emphasizing the crucial role these species played in maintaining ecosystem balance.

The disappearance of megafauna reduced nutrient movement by almost 90%, leading to a significant decline in ecosystem productivity.

Without humans, Earth would resemble African ecosystems, teeming with life, suggesting that human activity had a profound impact on the extinction of megafauna species.

Climate change may have contributed to the extinction of mammoths, as the warming climate led to changes in vegetation and habitats, making it difficult for these species to survive.

Human activity, including hunting, may have also played a role in the extinction of mammoths, as the expansion of human populations led to increased pressure on these species.

The extinction of megafauna, including the woolly mammoths, had a significant impact on ecosystems, leading to uneven element distribution and a decline in ecosystem productivity.

The loss of apex predators, such as the woolly mammoths, caused trophic cascades in ecosystems, leading to a decline in ecosystem integrity.

The removal of wolves, a key predator, impacted ecosystem interactions, leading to declines in tree species and an overabundance of deer populations.

The extinction of megafauna led to an increase in grassland fires worldwide, as the loss of herbivores led to an accumulation of dry grass and leaves.

The introduction of new livestock took time to adapt to changed ecosystems, further emphasizing the significant impact of megafauna extinction on ecosystem function.

Grazing shapes fire activity in modern ecosystems, highlighting the ongoing legacy of megafauna extinction on ecosystem processes.

The long-term consequences of megafauna extinction are still evident in modern ecosystems, with many ecosystems lacking the ecological integrity that once existed.

The analysis of DNA from Arctic locations and modern plants and animals has provided valuable insights into the extinction of megafauna, including the woolly mammoths.

The speed of climate change was the main factor in megafauna extinction, as these species were unable to adapt quickly to changing landscapes and food scarcity.

The warming climate led to changes in vegetation and habitats, making it difficult for megafauna species to survive, and ultimately contributing to their extinction.

The study of the extinction of woolly mammoths and other megafauna species can provide insights into the impact of climate change and human activity on ecosystems and the importance of conservation efforts.

The woolly mammoths, which lived from 300,000 to 10,000 years ago, went extinct due to a combination of climate change and human hunting.

Title:

Content: What we know as the Ice Age, the last long period during which global temperatures dropped dramatically and the polar ice expanded to cover much of the earth, is more properly called the Last Glacial Period (as there have been multiple ice ages).

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It started around 115,000 years ago and lasted for over 100,000 years. In that time many animal lineages rose and fell. In particular, it is known that many large mammal species went extinct during the transition from the Ice Age to the present interglacial period (from around 50,000 to 5,000 years ago).

These extinctions are thought to have occurred due to a combination of a quickly changing climate, changing vegetation and increases in human hunting. These megafauna included some truly huge and charismatic animals, from the iconic woolly mammoth to huge cave bears, to giant sloths standing nearly 12 feet tall! In this list you will find out about some extraordinary (now extinct) animals that lived during the age of ice and snow.

10 now-extinct animals from the Ice Age

1. Neanderthals

Our own species, Homo sapiens, emerged about 300,000 years ago, so persisted through the last ice age. We were not the only ancient humans around, however. Surviving the frigid temperatures along with us were our evolutionary cousins, the Neanderthals. This species of hominid emerged at a similar time to us but went extinct around 40,000 years ago – during the Ice Age.

Theories as to why they went extinct vary, from outcompetion from or diseases introduced by Homo sapiens to assimilation into the human gene pool. However, recent theories suggest that the primary driver might have been climate change. It is thought that despite behavioural and biological adaptations to the cold they simply struggled to survive the frigid conditions and lack of available food. How we survived and they didn’t is an interesting question.

2. Woolly mammoths (Mammuthus primigenius)

Probably the most well-known of all Ice Age animals is the woolly mammoth (in part thanks to the film character Manny!). Woolly mammoths lived from about 300,000 years ago up until about 10,000 years ago. The appearance of these elephant-sized animals is perhaps the best known of any prehistoric creature, due to the many frozen specimens that have been found, with soft tissue preserved.

With their thick coat of hair, large fat reserves, and specially adapted 'antifreeze' blood they were very well adapted to the cold. They were also very important to the survival of ancient humans throughout the Ice Age; their coats, meat and bones provided valuable sources of warmth, food and building materials for homo sapiens and Neanderthals alike.

3. Giant ground sloth (Megatherium americanum)

These beasts were very different to the sloths we know and love today! Standing at a whopping 3.7m when up on hind legs and weighing up to four tonnes (as opposed to the 5kg of a modern sloth), they were truly colossal.

With its ability to walk on its hind legs, it was in fact the largest bipedal mammal of all time. They lived in the woodlands and grasslands of South America, and fossils have been found dating back from around 400,000 years ago to 10,000 years ago. Despite its huge fearsome claws, it was actually a vegetarian, feeding on leaves and grasses.

4. Cave bears (Ursus spelaeus)

Slightly more modest in size, though still pretty massive, was the cave bear. Weighing in at between 400 and 1,000kg, the largest cave bears were comparable in size to modern-day polar bears. They could be found across Europe and Asia, including in the UK.

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We have a very good idea of what they looked like, as in 2020 a perfectly preserved specimen was found in the Russian Arctic, its remains revealed by melting permafrost. Even its teeth and nose were intact.

The specimen was dated to between 22,000 and 39,500 years old, living towards the end of the time of the cave bears, who are thought to have gone extinct 24,000 years ago. It is thought that hunting by humans, as well as competition with them over caves, may have contributed to their disappearance.

5. Dire wolf (Canis dirus)

That’s right, dire wolves are not just fictional pets from Game of Thrones, they were real animals. However, despite the name, and a lot of physical similarities, recent genetic analysis has revealed that they were not actually very closely related to grey wolves at all and were relatively closer to African jackals.

These canids were seemingly a common feature of the American Late Pleistocene landscape (approx. 250,000 to 13,000 years ago), roaming the grasslands, plains, and woods and preying on megafauna including giant ground sloths. There is almost an overabundance of fossil data on this species, with over 4,000 individuals excavated from California’s La Brea tar pits alone.

6. Sabre Tooth Cat (Smilodon genus)

The La Brea tar pits have also been responsible for giving us insights about another iconic Ice Age predator – the sabre tooth cat. More than 3,000 fossilised individuals have been pulled from the ooze, and their teeth in particular have been a valuable source of information about their diets and lifestyle.

Scientists have been able to examine the wear patterns on their iconic gnashers to determine that rather than bringing down very large prey like bison on the open plains, as was previously thought, they most likely fed primarily on smaller forest-dwelling animals like tapirs and deer. They were ambush predators similar to many modern-day big cats.

7. Irish elk (Megaloceros giganteus)

As you can probably guess from the scientific name, this species of deer was BIG. They stood at over 1.8m tall at shoulder height and had the largest antlers of any known deer, extinct or living. These colossal antlers must have been something to behold, spanning up to a whopping 3.5 metres.

Despite the name, this elk was not restricted to Ireland, but some of the most well-preserved fossil specimens have been found there. The most recent remains come from western Russia and have been dated to approximately 7,700 years ago – seemingly another victim of the megafaunal extinction event that occurred around the end of the Ice Age.

8. Giant Beaver (Castoroides genus)

Continuing the theme of larger versions of modern-day animals is the giant beaver, with an average length of about 1.8m. Its teeth were large to match, with some reaching up to 15cm, about the size of a hot dog.

There is no definitive evidence that they built dams as modern beavers do, but it is plausible that these immense incisors could have been used for woodcutting. What we do know is that they had smaller, smoother brains than modern-day beavers, which could indicate that they had less behavioural and social complexity.

9. Megalania (Varanus priscus)

So far this list has focused on mega-mammals, but what about other Ice Age species? Understandably it was hard for cold-blooded species like reptiles to survive frozen ice age temperatures across much of the globe, but in fact, not all of the world was icy, and some places remained habitable.

One of these places was Australia, where giant reptiles ruled. These included huge land-living crocodiles, massive snakes and Megalania – a truly monstrous relative of the Komodo dragon. This monitor lizard reached an estimated length of 7 metres and was a key land predator, at the very top of the food chain.

It has been suggested that the loss of its mega-reptile predators has left the Australian ecosystem out of kilter, allowing introduced mammals to reign unchecked.

10. Diprotodon (Diprotodon genus)

Another feature of the Australian Ice Age landscape was not a reptile, but a huge marsupial mammal – in fact, the largest marsupial to have ever lived. Diprotodon measured an estimated 4m head to tail tip and weighed as much as 3,500 kg, dwarfing the current largest marsupial, the red kangaroo, which checks in at a mere 2.7m and 90kg.

Their closest modern relatives are actually much smaller: wombats and koalas. It also has the distinction of being the only known seasonally migrating marsupial, trekking very far in search of food and watering holes.

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Main image: Artist's impression of a sabre tooth cat. © Daniel Eskridge/Getty

Authors

Leoma WilliamsAnimal behavior researcher and science writer

Leoma Williams is currently studying for a PhD at the University of Manchester, and writes periodically for both the website and print magazine

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How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

from 300,000 years ago up until 10,000 years ago

When did the wooly mammoth mostly become extinct?

Their extinction occurred during the transition from the Ice Age to the interglacial period, with a combination of climate change and human activity likely causing their extinction.

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

Climate change reduced grassland habitats, which were essential for the survival of woolly mammoths, and this reduction is thought to have contributed to their extinction.

Title:

Content: Woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius)

The most famous of the 10 mammoth species known to have existed is undoubtedly the woolly mammoth. Standing at around the same size as today’s African elephants, this magnificent animal roamed the northern hemisphere for roughly half a million years, becoming extinct by around 2000 BC.

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The reasons for the woolly mammoth’s demise are multifaceted. As the climate warmed at the end of the last Ice Age, and forests spread across the northern hemisphere, the grassland habitats in which the animal thrived were drastically reduced. This, combined with hunting pressures from humans, meant the woolly mammoth population ended up being restricted to just a couple of islands in the Arctic Ocean near Siberia and Alaska.

Some scientists hope to bring the woolly mammoth back from extinction, but with African and Asian elephant populations still facing a huge range of threats, many believe that our focus should be on preserving those animals instead.

Dodo (Raphus cucullatus)

For a large bird species that only became extinct relatively recently, we know surprisingly little about the dodo and its behaviours. In fact, there is just one near- complete dodo skeleton with bones from one bird, and there is only one specimen that contains soft tissue.

What we do know is that the dodo was restricted to Mauritius, an island in the Indian Ocean off the eastern coast of Madagascar and part of the Mascarene Archipelago, and was a relative to doves and pigeons. It’s thought that natural selection caused the animal to evolve into a flightless bird, with the species no longer needing to fly on an island with no predators.

However, when humans – and the animals they brought with them – first came to Mauritius in the 16th century, the dodo became extremely vulnerable. As well as being hunted for meat, it suffered from habitat loss and the predation of its eggs, resulting in its extinction by c1680.

Thylacine (Thylacinus cynocephalus)

Also known as the Tasmanian tiger or Tasmanian wolf, the thylacine was a carnivorous mammal originally found in Australia and New Guinea. Despite being similar in appearance to the domestic dog, it was actually a marsupial – a group of mammals that also includes kangaroos, koalas, wombats and opossums – and had a pouch.

Once widespread, the thylacine became extinct on the Australian mainland no less than 2,000 years ago, although the reasons for this are unknown. The species then became restricted to the island of Tasmania, off the south coast of Victoria, with between 2,000–4,000 individuals remaining when the British arrived in the early 19th century.

Eventually, the thylacine was persecuted as it was deemed a threat to livestock. The last known captive individual died from exposure at a zoo in Hobart in 1936 after being accidentally left out overnight. It’s thought that the last wild thylacines died in the 1960s, but that hasn’t stopped persistent rumours over the species’ continued survival.

Great auk (Pinguinus impennis)

Despite being similar in colouration and shape and bearing the genus name Pinguinus, the great auk wasn’t a relative of penguins, but was instead a member of the same family as puffins and guillemots.

Once a relatively common species in the North Atlantic, it bred on remote rocky islands such as Funk Island off the coast of Newfoundland, which was described by one 18th- century sailor as being “entirely covered with those fowls, so close that a man could not put his foot between them.”

However, exploration of the North Atlantic seas by European sailors spelled danger for the flightless seabird, with overharvesting of its eggs and adults for meat, feathers and body parts dramatically reducing the population. Attempts were made to protect the great auk, but that only increased its worth to collectors.

Sadly, the last breeding pair were killed and their single egg accidentally crushed by fishermen on Eldey Island, Iceland, on 3 July 1844.

Xerces butterfly (Glaucopsyche xerces)

Named after the Persian kings Xerxes I and Xerxes II (whose names are sometimes spelled ‘Xerces’ in France), this diminutive blue butterfly species lived among the coastal sand dunes of the San Francisco Peninsula, where its caterpillar preferred to feed on a single plant species.

However, urban development resulted in the loss of the plant, which could not survive in disturbed soil, and thus the loss of the Xerces blue in the 1940s – the first example of a butterfly becoming extinct due to human activity in North America.

Later, the Xerces Society, a non-profit conservation organisation established in 1971, was named in memory of the lost invertebrate.

For a while, there was uncertainty as to whether the Xerces blue was a distinct species or a subspecies of another blue butterfly. However, a scientific paper published in 2021 examined the DNA of a museum specimen collected in 1928 and proved that it was indeed a distinct species.

Passenger pigeon (Ectopistes migratorius)

The passenger pigeon was one of the most abundant pigeon species on the planet. Native to North America, it was called jahgowa by the Seneca Tribe, which translates to “big bread”, as it was a source of food by the Seneca and the rest of the Haudenosaunee people. Despite this, the hunting of the species was carefully regulated by rules set by each tribe.

However, after colonisation by the Europeans, hunting of the passenger pigeon increased and gradually became more industrial and commercialised. As the population declined, the species then became vulnerable to further pressures such as habitat loss and predation by other animals.

The last living passenger pigeon was a female named Martha, who was kept at Cincinnati Zoo in Ohio. She died on 1 September 1914 – one of the few times we have known the absolute date of a species’ extinction. Her death contributed to the creation of the US Migratory Bird Treaty Act, which requires permits to hunt some migratory bird species.

Golden toad (Incilius periglenes)

So-named for the brilliant yellow-orange colouration of the male (the female was black with yellow and red patterning), the golden toad has become a poster child for extinctions connected to the climate crisis.

Found in the Monteverde Cloud Forest of Costa Rica, the amphibian spent most of the year underground. It only emerged for a few days each April, with males fighting with each other around pools of rainwater in order to mate with females.

In 1987, roughly 1,500 golden toads were observed. However, the following year, only 10 toads were found, and in 1989, just one male. That one male was the last golden
toad ever seen, and the species was officially declared extinct in 2004.

While the exact cause of extinction is unknown, the climate crisis – combined with habitat loss and an infectious disease called chytridiomycosis – are all thought to have played a part.

Baiji (Lipotes vexillifer)

The baiji was a freshwater dolphin that lived in the Yangtze River in China, the third-longest river in the world. Although still listed as ‘Critically Endangered’ on the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s Red List, having last been assessed in 2017, the species is considered extinct by conservationists. In fact, both the last confirmed sighting of a wild individual and the death of the last captive individual occurred in 2002.

The Yangtze River is also home to the Yangtze finless porpoise, the only freshwater porpoise in the world. Like the baiji, its existence is currently threatened by overfishing, shipping traffic and noise pollution.

However, the 2017 suspension of sand mining in Dongting Lake – a flood basin of the Yangtze in China’s Hunan province – has seen the finless porpoise return to areas that it had previously been avoiding.

Pinta Island giant tortoise (Chelonoidis nigra abingdonii or Chelonoidis abingdonii)

While there is debate about whether the giant tortoises of the Galápagos Islands are subspecies of the same species or a completely different species altogether, one thing is certain: Lonesome George was the last of his kind.

George was a Pinta Island tortoise, a species (or subspecies) that was already thought to have been extinct until he was discovered alone on the island that gave George and his former companions their collective name.

There were attempts to find other Pinta Island tortoises, and to mate him with closely related females, but to no avail. He died in 2012 of natural causes when he was around 100 years old.

Curiously, scientists believe it might be possible to bring back the Pinta Island tortoise, or at least a closely related version. Researchers have discovered hybrid tortoises with Pinta Island tortoise genes on nearby Isabela Island, with their Pinta Island ancestors having been moved there by whalers and pirates.

Megan Shersby is a naturalist, science writer and communicator. She was previously editorial and digital coordinator at BBC Wildlife Magazine

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This content first appeared in the November 2023 issue of BBC History Revealed

Authors

Megan ShersbyNaturalist, writer and content creator
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According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

The warming climate caused trees and swamp plants to replace mammoth pastures, leading to a decrease in the population and genetic diversity of woolly mammoths.

Title:

Content: Partners news
The cause of the extinction of mammoths
Scientists have found that mammoths died out due to climate change
Photo: Stanislav Krasilnikov / TASS
An international team of researchers found that the cause of the extinction of mammoths in Siberia was primarily a sharp climate change, not human activity.
The article is published in the journal Nature.
Woolly mammoths became extinct only about four thousand years ago.
They were not only the main source of meat of ancient people – the latter made from their bones the basis for dwellings, from their tusks made harpoons and even musical instruments.
Therefore, there is a widespread theory that the main cause of extinction was humans.
Researchers from the Institute of Earth Sciences of St. Petersburg State University together with colleagues from the UK, Denmark, China, Norway and the United States decided to restore the appearance of the tundrosteppe, which was inhabited by mammoths.
To do this, they using the shotgun method — obtaining from a random massive sample of cloned fragments of the original sequence — analyzed the DNA of ancient plants and animals collected from 535 different places in the Arctic, where the mammoth lived, over 20 years.
They also analyzed the DNA of more than 1,500 modern plants and animals.
Researchers were able to map the distribution of populations of mammoths and other representatives of the megafauna of the tundrosteppe.
They saw that over time their populations and genetic diversity became smaller and smaller — making survival increasingly difficult.
With the end of the Pleistocene about 12 thousand years ago and the accompanying retreat of glaciers and the formation of rivers, lakes and marshes, vegetation has decreased in volume, and it has become insufficient to maintain the previous level of populations.
As the climate warms, trees and swamp plants have taken the place of former mammoth pastures.
“We have shown that climate change, in particular rainfall, has directly led to changes in vegetation.
According to our models, people did not have any influence on them [mammoths], ” said the first author of the work, a researcher at the University of Cambridge Yuchen Wang.
However, the extinction of mammoths was influenced not only by the warming of the climate itself.
“His speed was the last nail in the lid of the coffin – they (megafauna tundrosteppe – approx.
“Tape.ru ”) could not adapt quickly enough, when the landscape radically changed and food was not enough, ” said the head of the scientific group, Professor of Copenhagen and Cambridge universities Eske Willerslev.
Only what is important to you is in the “Tape of the Day ” in Telegram.
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According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

food sources disappearing
pastures becoming swampy
restricted habitat
shrank grassland

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

Human hunting pressures also played a role in the extinction of woolly mammoths, with evidence suggesting that humans interacted with mammoths for 800 years in Siberia and accumulated mammoth bones for ivory technology.

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This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility:

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Siberia's 'mammoth graveyard' reveals 800-year human interactions with woolly beasts

Woolly mammoths are evocative of a bygone era, when Earth was gripped within an Ice Age. Current knowledge places early mammoth ancestors in the Pliocene (2.58–5.33 million years ago, Ma) before their populations expanded in the Pleistocene (2.58 Ma–11,700 years ago, kyr). However, as climate changed, their numbers dwindled to isolated populations in modern Siberia and Alaska, until their last dated survival 4 kyr ago.

In the East Siberian Arctic (>70 °N), there is not only evidence of significant woolly mammoth populations, but also how humans interacted with them, the focus of new research in Quaternary Science Reviews.

Along the Berelekh River, Russia, a 'mammoth graveyard' can be found. Here, thousands of disarticulated bones, representing a minimum of 156 individual mammoths, found alongside an indicate the close proximity of these two communities, forming the Berelekh geoarchaeological complex.

Dr. Vladimir Pitulko, of the Russian Academy of Sciences, and colleagues aimed to assess the relationship between the 'mammoth graveyard' and the archaeological site through a re-examination of stratigraphic and paleogeographic data obtained in 2009, with new fieldwork focused on the left riverbanks where have readily yielded from their home in the sediment and appeared on the water's edge. Alongside them are remains of Pleistocene hare, Arctic fox and wolves, as well as soot and charcoal from hearths and worked mammoth tusks (one being an unfinished throwing spear).

The researchers suggest humans created these bone accumulations as a byproduct of the production of mammoth ivory technology, while hares may have been targeted for fur to produce winter clothing.

Notably, evidence of blowfly pupae activity on cavities in skulls and bones is indicative that the mammoth carcasses were added to the 'graveyard' de-fleshed. Indeed, there appears to be evidence of sorting of the bones, with only the most valuable transported to Berelekh from the area in which the mammoth was killed, leaving behind parts such as spinal columns, carpal ('hand') and tarsal ('foot') bones.

There are three radiocarbon dated peaks in woolly mammoth accumulation at 11.8, 12.2 and 12.4 kyr ago, which fall within known human settlement of the area (11.2–12.4 kyr ago) during the Bølling-Allerød deglacial, when the warmed and pollen evidence suggests the region became more arid.

Fluctuations in the abundance of mammoths in the 'graveyard' suggest human settlement of the area may also have changed through time (frequent occupation but not permanent), which the researchers attribute to on the floodplain permitting suitability for erecting campsites.

Radiocarbon dating of mammoth remains identifies their presence here pre-dating human settlement (beginning ~12.5 kyr ago), but also shows that humans remained in the area (until ~11.2 kyr ago) after mass mammoth remains accumulation declined (~11.8 kyr ago).

Given this, four possible causes are suggested by the scientists to explain such a significant mass accumulation of bones: 1) mass death by natural causes or human, 2) repeated group deaths in the same location, likely due to human predation, 3) concentration of remains by , such as river action, or 4) solely derived from human predation or scavenging from deceased carcasses.

However, the latter is considered to be the most likely to produce useful tools from ivory tusks, as well as meat to feed the community, as there is no evidence on the bones for a cause of mass death, radiocarbon ages do not cluster into multiple phases for recurrent death deposits and stream flows were unlikely to reach sufficient velocities to transport such heavy bones.

These findings are concurrent with mammoth remains at the Yana Paleolithic site, also in Siberia. Here, estimates suggest the 'graveyard' increased by 1–2 mammoths per year rather than a mass death event, a figure Dr. Pitulko and colleagues conclude could be similar or even higher for Berelekh.

This research is significant as it alters the previously-held belief that there was a lag of 50–80 years between mammoth bone accumulation from natural processes (such as deposition in flood channels) and , instead now defining a close relationship between the two over 700–800 years. Sadly, now that human-mammoth relationship has continued as ivory hunters have looted the site beyond further study.

More information: Vladimir V. Pitulko et al, From the Berelekh 'mammoth graveyard' to Berelekh geo-archaeological complex: Paleoenvironment, site formation processes, and human-mammoth relationships, Quaternary Science Reviews (2024). DOI: 10.1016/j.quascirev.2024.108692

Journal information: Quaternary Science Reviews

© 2024 Science X Network

Citation: Siberia's 'mammoth graveyard' reveals 800-year human interactions with woolly beasts (2024, June 10) retrieved 10 June 2024 from https://phys.org/news/2024-06-siberia-mammoth-graveyard-reveals-year.html
This document is subject to copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study or research, no part may be reproduced without the written permission. The content is provided for information purposes only.

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How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

The archaeological evidence from a site in Austria, where woolly mammoth bones were found, suggests that humans may have hunted and slaughtered woolly mammoths, indicating coordination and planning among Paleolithic people.

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Content: Woolly Mammoth Bones Unearthed in Austrian Wine Cellar

It wasn’t the first time that ancient artifacts were discovered in one of Kamptal’s wine cellars.

An Austrian winemaker renovating his cellar unearthed a trove of woolly mammoth bones that could expand our understanding of the relationship between humans and the prehistoric beasts.

Andreas Pernerstorfer’s winery is in the notable winemaking and cultural region of Kamptal in northeastern Austria. After stumbling upon the huge bones in the dirt floor, he reported his discovery to Austria’s Federal Monuments Office. The Austrian Archaeological Institute has been excavating the site since March 2024 to a depth of 55 feet below ground and says it’s the first significant paleontology site found in Austria in a century.

The bones are believed to be between 30,000 and 40,000 years old and belonged to at least three woolly mammoths. According to Hannah Parow-Souchon, the paleontologist leading the excavation, the discovery is significant because mammoth bones are rarely found packed together. This could mean they were bunched there by humans, which could indicate they were hunted and slaughtered by humans; the site might be the remains of a Holocene Epoch cookout.

Most archaeologists agree that humans gathered in groups and used spears and other tools to take down woolly mammoths and other megafauna, which would have been immense sources of meat, hides, and bones to use as raw materials for tools. This activity could have contributed to the animals’ extinction

There is some debate whether preying on the massive beasts was a regular practice for Stone Age people, and science is foggy about how a band of simple humans could get the drop on an animal that stood 10 feet tall, weighed as much as six tons, and had fearsome protective tusks. The process would reveal a lot about coordination and planning among Paleolithic people.

Parow-Souchon said in a statement from the Austrian Academy of Sciences that it is possible that humans set a trap for mammoths there. She also said it was the most significant discovery of woolly mammoth remains in more than 100 years; most such sites in Europe have been dug up and hollowed out, with their archaeological value lost over time.

This is not the first such find in Kamptal. About 150 years ago, relics of early human life—including flint artifacts, jewelry fossils, and charcoal—were discovered there in a wine cellar next door.

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

The paleontological evidence, including a 'mammoth graveyard' found in East Siberian Arctic with 156 individual mammoths, shows that mammoth populations dwindled due to climate change.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

The analysis of DNA of ancient plants and animals from 535 places also supports the idea that climate change was a major driver of woolly mammoth extinction.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

However, the exact role of human hunting in the extinction of woolly mammoths is still debated, with some studies suggesting that human predation or scavenging was the most likely cause of bone accumulation.

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

The combination of climate change and human hunting is thought to have led to the extinction of woolly mammoths around 2000 BC, with their populations restricted to Arctic islands near Siberia and Alaska.

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

When did the last population of wooly mammoth become extinct?

Where were the last areas of wooly mammoth habitat?

islands in the Arctic Ocean near Siberia and Alaska

The study of woolly mammoth extinction can provide insights into the impact of climate change and human activity on species survival and the importance of conservation efforts.

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Content: What can old bones teach us about adapting to climate change? More than you’d think.

In a new paper published in the journal PNAS last week, 25 archaeologists and anthropologists analyzed thousands of years’ worth of human remains from nearly every continent to learn how ancient people responded to rapid shifts in the climate. They studied the health of the people during hard times, comparing characteristics between societies to see what made a difference.

Wherever they looked, they found that some cultures adapted to drought, changing rainfall patterns, and fluctuating temperatures better than others. In general, when people lived in rigid, hierarchical societies, depended too much on agriculture, and lived in close quarters, they faced the most destruction from these challenges. In Europe, for instance, the Little Ice Age coincided with the Black Death and the Hundred Years’ War. On the other hand, people who lived in more mobile societies with diverse food sources and more flexible social structures fared better, cooperating with each other to survive.

Contrary to the story that often gets told, migration, violence, and civilizational collapse are not inevitable responses to environmental stress, said Gwen Robbins Schug, the lead author of the paper and a professor of biology at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. While relocation is often a solution for coping with shifts in the climate, it’s not the only way, and doesn’t necessarily lead to conflict and violence. “There are many times in history where people successfully navigated climate and environmental change and they didn’t migrate,” Robbins Schug said.

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Recent research has countered the idea that abrupt shifts in the climate unavoidably led to the breakdown of ancient civilizations. Sure, environmental shifts caused serious problems — and sometimes catastrophe — but pop-science books have tended to focus on the most dramatic tales, such as the collapse of Easter Island or the Mayan civilization, sometimes fudging the facts to fit a particular narrative. They also tend to ignore how many groups managed to survive, responding and reorganizing without losing their core identity. This preoccupation with crumbling societies has resulted in a warped picture of the past, one report published in Nature argued.

It has also fueled a fatalistic view, sometimes called “doomism,” about our ability to survive the alarming rise in temperatures today. Misconceptions about collapse, migration, and violence in the face of climate change could end up shaping modern-day policy decisions, with serious consequences, Robbins Schug argues. “What should actually be driving policy is the notion that cooperation is much more common in human evolution,” she said. “We would not be where we are today without cooperation.”

Robbins Schug and the other researchers assessed dozens of studies looking at societies stretching back 5,000 years through the Middle Ages, pulling out common themes in how they responded to environmental stress. They studied societies hailing from locations in present-day North America, Argentina, Chile, China, Ecuador, England, India, Japan, Niger, Oman, Pakistan, Peru, Thailand, and Vietnam.

What they found was a divide between large, rigid societies and smaller ones that were more nimble and cooperative. Consider the megadrought that hit Asia around 2200 B.C., one of the most severe climate events in the last 10,000 years. Prior to the drought, the Indus Valley civilization in contemporary Pakistan and northwest India had grown rapidly, building dense, complex cities and trade routes. But diseases like leprosy and tuberculosis thrived in tight quarters and spread through trade, economic opportunities started drying up, and unpredictable monsoon rainfall made the situation worse. Violence spread; Indus cities were largely abandoned within 200 years.

By comparison, the drought didn’t do as much damage to hunting-and-gathering communities in Japan, China, and the United Arab Emirates, less hierarchical societies with more dietary diversity. In Japan, people in Jomon cultures ate lots of chestnuts that they cultivated in addition to what they hunted, gathered, and fished.

The modern-day Four Corners region in the American Southwest offers another example of how to cope with environmental stresses. From the years 800 to 1350, temperatures swung from one extreme to the other, and the area oscillated between drought and floods. But at Black Mesa in northern Arizona, the desert-farming population grew slowly and steadily thanks to a series of adaptations. People moved around as water sources shifted, created “eco-niches” to attract rabbits to supplement their diet, and built widespread cooperative networks to trade resources across a large area.

The new paper suggests that a preoccupation with climate-driven violence might come, in part, from a focus on European history. The Little Ice Age that started in 1300 was marked by widespread famine, epidemics like the Black Death, and wars. The increase in violence seen during this time wasn’t an inevitable outcome of a changing climate, the study’s authors argue, but an example of how a specific historical and cultural context created “an atmosphere conducive to violence as a response to stress,” with deep economic inequality, endemic warfare, and religious fundamentalism as backdrop.

The study also suggests that migration may be a healthy adaptation to a changing world. While migration is often painted as a scary, unnatural force, some say it might be time to reframe the phenomenon, envisioning it as a way to move out of harm’s way and actively seek better living conditions. For instance, during times of high aridity in sub-Saharan Africa, migration offered “a successful strategy for dwindling local resources,” the study says.

It’s a reminder that, even though the scale of modern-day climate change today is unprecedented and frightening, people have dealt with environmental problems before. You could say that some lessons for how to deal with climate change are written in their bones.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

The comparison of archaeological and paleontological evidence suggests that both climate-driven and anthropogenic factors contributed to the extinction of woolly mammoths.

The loss of megafauna, including the woolly mammoths, led to a 90% decrease in phosphorus redistribution, highlighting the significant impact of these species on nutrient cycling.

Title:

Content: Science 2021-11-11T12: 03: 35 + 02: 00
Ukrainian News
Giant armadillos and mammoths.
Scientists have told what the Earth would look like if there were no people on it.
Giant armadillos and mammoths.
Scientists have told what the Earth would look like if there were no people on it.
This is what a glyptodon might look like, an armadillo-like creature that went extinct during the Ice Age.
Photo by Stocktrek Images
Man has greatly changed the landscape of planet Earth since the time of the development of tools.
And the more active the progress, the faster a person changes the face of the world around.
But if there were no humans on the planet, then there would be giant animals that are now extinct.
This conclusion was made by scientists, writes the publication Live science.
The land would belong to giant plants and animals.
Along with megafauna, Neanderthals, the distant ancestors of man, would also live.
Animals would be bigger.
For example, moa birds, similar to ostriches, would still live in New Zealand.
After humans came to the islands, the birds became extinct in 200 years.
According to Seren Faurbi of the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, for thousands of years, humans have played a crucial role in the extinction of many giant animals.
Without us, today ’ s Earth would in many ways resemble an African ecosystem teeming with life.
Thus, the animal world of Europe would resemble Africa with its elephants, lions and rhinos.
But instead of African lions, cave lions would live - they are larger.
And in Africa, there would be giant bears and animals similar to armadillos, but the size of a car.
Scientists are still arguing about what led to the extinction of mammoths.
This could be both climate change and human activity.
Christopher Doughty of the University of Northern Arizona studied how representatives of megafauna contributed to the distribution of seeds.
He believes that with the extinction of large animals, the redistribution of elements such as phosphorus, calcium and magnesium decreased by 90%.
Without humans, these elements would have been more evenly distributed, he said, leading to a more productive system.
Without humans, the climate would be different.
But what exactly – scientists can not say exactly.
As reported by Ukrainian News, in Tanzania found the bones of a previously unknown species of titanosaur with a unique coccyx in the shape of a heart.
The deposits in which the bones were found are dated to 100-110 million years old.
On the British Isle of Wight, archaeologists have found two new species of dinosaurs that were predators of large size.
In size, the fossil lizards were no less than a bus and hunted both on land and in water.
They had crocodile-like snouts, sharp teeth, and a whip-like tail.
In addition, scientists have discovered a small crab that was stuck in wood tar 100 million years ago, so perfectly preserved.
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The extinction of megafauna also decreased calcium and magnesium distribution, further emphasizing the crucial role these species played in maintaining ecosystem balance.

The disappearance of megafauna reduced nutrient movement by almost 90%, leading to a significant decline in ecosystem productivity.

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Content: Cave lions in Europe and mammoths in the United States.
Scientists have told what the Earth would be without Homo sapiens
The researchers say that in general, the planet could be an exciting place, which would be inhabited by representatives of megafauna.
Scientists believe that without humans, the Earth would be a more wild and fertile place, in which giants such as ostrich moa birds with a height of 3.6 meters still lived.
They lived in New Zealand for millions of years, but disappeared 750 years after their land was invaded by man, writes LiveScience.
The vanished giant moas and eagles of Haast, whose wingspan was 2.6 meters or more, are a small example of how human activity has changed the planet.
The survival of such large animals is crucial in thinking about what the Earth would be like without humans, as such giants have a crucial influence on landscapes.
Senior lecturer in zoology at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, Seren Forby, says humans have played a crucial role in the extinction of many large mammals.
Forby led the study, published in the journal Diversity and Distributions.
It said that without humans, the Earth would resemble an ecoregion in East Africa, the Serengeti, teeming with life.
In such a scenario, extinct animals, along with elephants, rhinos and lions, would live throughout Europe.
For example, the African lions (Panthera leo) would still be replaced by cave lions (Panthera spelaea), a larger species that lived in Europe about 12,000 years ago.
At the same time, America would be home to larger relatives of elephants and bears, as well as unique species such as the glyptodon – car-sized armadillos and giant sloths.
“In a world without humans, there would be a lot more different species of large mammals, as well as a much more open habitat, ” says Forby.
Elephants or other species of large animals do not tolerate obstacles in their search for food.
In such cases, the territory acquires a less wooded appearance.
The world would be brighter
During the last Pleistocene Ice Age (2.6 million to 11,700 years ago), the Earth was rich in megafauna.
Much of it went extinct after the end of this ice age or millennia later.
A 2021 study from the journal Nature found that climate change had wiped out woolly mammoths as well as other Arctic megafauna, but humans also put additional pressure on these species by hunting them.
Christopher Doughty, an ecologist at the University of Northern Arizona, modeled how large animals, among other things, affected ecosystems by moving seeds and nutrients during eating and defecating.
The expert found that the movement of elements such as phosphorus, calcium and magnesium, which play a crucial role in life, decreased by almost 90% along with the disappearance of megafauna.
The researcher emphasizes that without human intervention, all the necessary elements would be evenly distributed throughout the landscape.
Thus, the soil would be more fertile and productive.
Agriculture and zoning make land less fertile compared to systems in the wild.
Such increased fertility means that the Earth would be much richer in crops and colors, the planet would definitely be brighter without humans.
Without humans, the climate would be different.
Human induced global warming is known to have raised the average temperature by 1 degree Celsius since the early 20th century.
Consequently, the weather on the planet would be cooler without humanity.
A 2016 study in the journal Nature found that current warming delayed the onset of the ice age by at least 100,000 years.
But this should not have happened for another 50,000 years, so it is unlikely that without humans there would be another ice age on Earth right now.
People are inevitable
Modern humans (Homo sapiens) were not always the only hominins on the planet.
The disappearance of Homo sapiens could open up new perspectives for Neanderthals.
There is no single answer to the question of why the Neanderthals died out about 40 thousand years ago.
There were probably several reasons for their disappearance, and Homo sapiens are the main suspects.
Professor Chris Stringer from the Natural History Museum in London believes that the competition between Neanderthals and humans was one of the reasons for the disappearance of the former.
“If Homo sapiens hadn ’ t come to Europe about 45,000 or 50,000 years ago, I think Neanderthals and their descendants would still have lived on Earth, ” Stringer says.
The expert notes that Neanderthals led a complex life in Europe, they faced climate change, were a small group with low genetic diversity.
“Neanderthals probably were already in distress when modern humans came to their lands, and this factor could be the last, ” the expert notes.
But humans could have influenced the survival of more than just Neanderthals.
At least there is another relative of Homo sapiens who shared land with humans and Neanderthals: the Denisovans.
This line is closer to Neanderthals than to modern humans in terms of genes and appearance.
Judging by a number of studies, people interbred with Denisovans, because modern people continue to find the DNA of Denisovans.
It is assumed that Denisovans had a wider range of habitat than Neanderthals.
They may also have more genetic diversity than Neanderthals.
"Perhaps the Denisovans were even better species for survival than the Neanderthals," Stringer said.
In general, Denisovans and Neanderthals could pave the way similar to H. sapiens, moving from hunting and gathering to the development of agriculture.
"There is no obvious reason why Neanderthals or Denisovans would not have evolved if they had the time to do so," he said.

Without humans, Earth would resemble African ecosystems, teeming with life, suggesting that human activity had a profound impact on the extinction of megafauna species.

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

Climate change may have contributed to the extinction of mammoths, as the warming climate led to changes in vegetation and habitats, making it difficult for these species to survive.

Title:

Content: In one of the most common versions of the extinction of giant mamutes, it is claimed that this was caused by the hunting of ancient people.
Our ancestors literally ate most of the animals.
But recent studies say that this is not the case and people have become far from the main reason for the disappearance of mammoths.
Hunger caused by climate change is the real killer.
Searching for gold, but found mammoths: an incredible story with the Yukon
Drawing of a mammoth on the wall of the cave of Arcy-sur-Cure, France / Photo Wikipedia
The Hungry Death of Great Animals
It would seem that mammoths existed for millions of years and survived several ice ages.
That is, climate change did not affect them critically.
But as soon as they encountered humans, they began to die out.
Finally, we were able to prove that the problem was not only climate change, but also the speed of these changes.
This was the last nail in the coffin – the mammoths could not adapt quickly enough when the landscape changed dramatically and food became scarce.
- says the author of the study Eske Willerslev, a professor at the University of Cambridge and director of the Center for Geogenetics of the Lundbeck Foundation at the University of Copenhagen.
The team, led by Prof. Willerslev, sequenced the DNA of plant, animal, and their fossilized excrement, coprolites.
The selection of these samples lasted about 20 years and allowed us to fully understand why the majestic animals died out.
After the end of the last cooling, the glaciers began to melt.
The environment quickly became quite humid, leading to a chain change in flora.
Typical mamut habitats and pastures became increasingly swampy and vegetation changed accordingly.
As a result, there is simply no food left typical for animals.
From birth to death: scientists have fully investigated the life path of the mammoth
Giants did not have time to adapt to rapid changes, so the total number of mammoths was constantly declining.
Because of this, isolated and partially isolated animal populations arose, which already caused little genetic diversity.
It is clear that all this did not positively affect the chances of survival.
Scientists say climate change is critical.
When such changes destroyed mammoths and probably another megafauna.
Today, we live in a time when the average temperature on the planet is rising again, so we need to take this “harsh lesson ” seriously.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

food sources disappearing
restricted habitat
shrank grassland

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

Human activity, including hunting, may have also played a role in the extinction of mammoths, as the expansion of human populations led to increased pressure on these species.

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

The extinction of megafauna, including the woolly mammoths, had a significant impact on ecosystems, leading to uneven element distribution and a decline in ecosystem productivity.

The loss of apex predators, such as the woolly mammoths, caused trophic cascades in ecosystems, leading to a decline in ecosystem integrity.

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Content: The haunting howls of wolves fell mostly silent across America's West by the 1930s.

Their loss to the region has been largely overlooked by humans, even in our scientific research, a new review finds, but the impact of their absence is written loudly in the missing trees.

"Researchers generally agree that the loss of wolves and other large predators, followed by increased browsing by elk (Cervus canadensis), was the main cause for the decline in woody plant communities in many Western parks," write Oregon State University ecologist William Ripple and colleagues in their new paper.

This is another example of how everything on our living planet is tightly interconnected and how we fail to consider these vital links.

Ripple and team reviewed 96 ecological studies that took place between 1955 and 2021, within 11 of the region's national parks. They found only 39 of these studies considered the absence of the region's top predator, the gray wolf (Canis lupus).

"Studying an altered ecosystem without recognizing how or why the system has changed over time because of the absence of a large predator could have serious implications… like diagnosing a sick patient without a baseline health exam," explain the researchers.

"Various national parks in the western United States, which are considered the crown jewels of American wilderness, lack their apex predators, resulting in them being shadows of their supposed ecological integrity."

Loss of an ecosystem's apex predator causes domino effects through an ecosystem's food chain known as trophic cascades. As ecosystems can be such complex messes of interactions it's not always easy to see how trophic cascades will play out, particularly given they can be context-dependent.

So not every trophic cascade is found in each landscape, even if the same species are present. Reintroducing lost species, like the return of wolves to Yellowstone National Park, can't necessarily repair all the broken connections either, once the cascade of changes have taken place.

But historical records across the 11 parks reveal declines in several tree species, including black (Populus trichocarpa) and plains (Populus deltoides) cottonwoods, since wolves were eradicated.

Not only has removal of wolves messed with the web of connections stemming from their predation on deer, it's impacted the ecosystem interactions around coyotes (Canis latrans) as well.

"Wolves can reduce coyote populations, thereby mediating their predation of prey and smaller-predator populations, such as rodents, ungulates, small carnivores, leporids, and birds," write Ripple and team.

This includes greater predation of threatened and endangered species, a particularly concerning consequence amidst the sixth mass extinction.

The same scenario is occurring in the oceans, where the absence of reef sharks means too many green turtles are gorging on vital CO2 sequestering seagrass meadows, and in Australia, where the widespread eradication of dingoes means smaller predators like foxes and cats are having their fill of predator-naive marsupials.

Kangaroos are now also overabundant thanks to the lack of dingoes, joining deer in the top ten most abundant wild animals by biomass. Ripple previously found there are almost six times more deer in areas without wolves compared to areas with them.

Ecosystem restoration is more critical than ever as our destructive impacts on our living biosphere accelerate. But to have any success, it is crucial that we better understand the interactions that govern these environments in their historical functioning state, the researchers urge.

"We hope our study will be of use to both conservation organizations and government agencies in identifying ecosystem management goals," says Ripple.

This study was published in Bioscience.

The removal of wolves, a key predator, impacted ecosystem interactions, leading to declines in tree species and an overabundance of deer populations.

The extinction of megafauna led to an increase in grassland fires worldwide, as the loss of herbivores led to an accumulation of dry grass and leaves.

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Content: Saturday 12 November 1443 AH - 11 June 2022 |
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Extinction of these animals has increased grassland fires
Translated by Voice of Beirut International
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A study has identified that the loss of megafauna in grazing land 50,000 years ago has led to a dramatic increase in grassland fires worldwide.
These large herbivores, which included the iconic woolly mammoth, giant bison and ancient horses, are believed to have become extinct as the climate warms.
However, the experts who led the study from Yale University showed that their loss had conclusive effects, with herbs they no longer ingested to provide fuel for wildfires.
The team added that their findings highlight the need to consider the role of herbivores when predicting current and future global fire activity.
The research was conducted by ancient ecologist Alison Karp of Yale University, Connecticut, and her colleagues.
“These extinctions led to a series of consequences, ” Dr. Karp said, among them, she explained, the collapse of predators and the loss of fruit trees that relied on large herbivores to disperse their seeds.
“Studying these effects helps us understand how herbivores shape the global environment today. ”
The researchers wondered whether the loss of giant herbivores would likely lead to the accumulation of dry grass, leaves and wood, which would lead to an increase in fire activity.
In their study, experts compiled a large list of now lost mammals and approximate dates on which they became extinct across four continents.
Their analysis indicated that South America lost the largest grazing species (83 per cent of all species), followed by North America (68 per cent), Australia (44 per cent) and Africa (22 per cent).
The team then compared this data to records of past wildfire activity as recorded by the presence of coal in lake sediments from 410 locations around the world.
Not only did this reveal wildfire activity increase following the extinction of megafauna, but the Americas, which lost more grazing, saw greater increases in fire levels than in Australia and Africa, where changes were less.
According to Dr. Karp and her colleagues, pastures have changed around the world due to the loss of herbivores, the resulting fires and the loss of grasses eaten by grazing.
It took some time for new livestock breeders, including cattle, to adapt to new ecosystems.
However, the loss of large animal species, such as mastodons, giant sloths and Diprotodons in Australia, which all feed on shrubs and trees, has not been found to be associated with a similar increase in wildfires.
The team said the findings show how we should think about the role of wildlife and livestock herders in mitigating wildfires, especially given climate change.
Study author and ecologist Carla Staffer, also from Yale University, said: “This work really highlights how important grazing is in shaping fire activity. ”
"We need to pay close attention to these interactions if we are to accurately predict the future of fires."

The introduction of new livestock took time to adapt to changed ecosystems, further emphasizing the significant impact of megafauna extinction on ecosystem function.

Grazing shapes fire activity in modern ecosystems, highlighting the ongoing legacy of megafauna extinction on ecosystem processes.

The long-term consequences of megafauna extinction are still evident in modern ecosystems, with many ecosystems lacking the ecological integrity that once existed.

The analysis of DNA from Arctic locations and modern plants and animals has provided valuable insights into the extinction of megafauna, including the woolly mammoths.

The speed of climate change was the main factor in megafauna extinction, as these species were unable to adapt quickly to changing landscapes and food scarcity.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

The warming climate led to changes in vegetation and habitats, making it difficult for megafauna species to survive, and ultimately contributing to their extinction.

According to most recent research, what is the primary cause of wooly mammoth extinction?

How did climate change affect mammoth' habitat?

pastures becoming swampy
restricted habitat
shrank grassland

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What aspects of climate change contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?

The study of the extinction of woolly mammoths and other megafauna species can provide insights into the impact of climate change and human activity on ecosystems and the importance of conservation efforts.

How did humans contribute to the wooly mammoth extinction?

What are the causes of the wooly mammoth extinction?

What environmental factors contributed to the wooly mammoth extinction?