Dissecting the Cave Lion Diet

Dissecting the Cave Lion Diet

A quarter larger than today's lions, the European cave lion was one of the biggest cats around 12,000 years ago. Now, an unusually sophisticated analysis of its bones is revealing what these creatures ate—and why they may have disappeared.

Ancient Bird Remains Illuminate Lost World of Indonesia’s Homo floresiensis

Link: Ancient Bird Remains Illuminate Lost World of Indonesia’s Homo floresiensis

]A study of bird remains from the same cave that yielded bones of a mini human species called Homo floresiensis and nicknamed the hobbit has cast new light on the lost world of this enigmatic human relative. The findings hint that the hobbits’ island home was quite ecologically diverse, and raise the possibility that the tiny humans had to defend their kills from giant carnivorous birds.

Professor was right: Mastodon weapon was older than thought, scientists say

Link: Professor was right: Mastodon weapon was older than thought, scientists say

It’s not unusual for an archaeologist to get stuck in the past, but Carl Gustafson may be the only one consumed by events on the Olympic Peninsula in 1977. That summer, while sifting through earth in Sequim, Wash., the young Gustafson uncovered something extraordinary - a mastodon bone with a shaft jammed in it. This appeared to be a weapon that had been thrust into the beast’s ribs, a sign that humans had been around and hunting far earlier than anyone suspected.

Unfortunately for Gustafson, few scientists agreed. He was challenging orthodoxy with less-than-perfect evidence.

DNA suggests North American mammoth species interbred: Supposedly separate types may really have been one

Link: DNA suggests North American mammoth species interbred: Supposedly separate types may really have been one

Here, here on the palaeogenetics articles in the news lately!

LAS VEGAS — The two major species of North American mammoth may actually have been one. DNA analysis of the Ice Age beasts’ remains suggests that the woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius) interbred with what has been considered a separate, more southerly species — the Columbian mammoth (Mammuthus columbi).

Although separate animal species do interbreed now and then, mammoth mixing may have been more than an occasional fluke. Two Columbian specimens turn out to carry woollylike DNA inherited from their mothers, said Ross MacPhee of the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, who presented the findings November 3 at a meeting of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology.

CT Scans of Baby Mammoths Reveal Ice Age Mystery

Link: CT Scans of Baby Mammoths Reveal Ice Age Mystery

LAS VEGAS—Computed tomography (CT) scans of two extraordinarily well-preserved baby woolly mammoths from Siberia have yielded startling new insights into these iconic Ice Age beasts. Previously examinations of the external features of the mammoths suggested that the two creatures were quite similar, exhibiting the same developmental stage and similar age at death. But the new full-body scans—the first ever obtained for largely intact mammoths—tell a different story. Researchers unveiled the new findings on November 5 at the annual meeting of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology.

New cervid species found in middle miocene of Nei Mongol, China

Link: New cervid species found in middle miocene of Nei Mongol, China

Wang Li-Hua, a graduate student paleontologist from Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, identified a new species of cervid, Euprox altus, from the Middle Miocene fossil locality of Damiao (N42°00’31.4’’, E111°34’50’’), Siziwangqi, Nei Mongol, as reported in the latest issue of Vertebrata PalAsiatic 2011 (4). Its tooth morphology and comparison with other species suggest that during the latest Middle Miocene the Damiao area was a warm and humid environment.

What killed off the woolly mammoth still a mystery

Link: What killed off the woolly mammoth still a mystery

The culprits behind the extinctions of a number of Ice Age giants have now been identified — woolly rhinos were apparently done in by climate change, while ancient bison were downed by both climate and human influences.

However, whatever drove woolly mammoths extinct remains elusive.

Humans and climate contributed to extinctions of large ice-age mammals, study finds

Link: Humans and climate contributed to extinctions of large ice-age mammals, study finds

Both climate change and humans were responsible for the extinction of some large mammals, like the musk ox in this photo, according to research that is the first of its kind to use genetic, archeological, and climatic data together to infer the population history of large Ice-Age mammals. The large international team’s research, which will be published in the journal Nature, is expected to shed light on the possible fates of living species of mammals as our planet continues its current warming cycle. Credit: Beth Shapiro lab, Penn State University