Discover and read the best of Twitter Threads about #Pleistocene
Most recents (6)
Goosebeak or Cuvier’s beaked #whale (#Ziphius cavirostris): described as a fossil in 1823 but realised in 1872 to be the same as beached specimens reported in 1820s but given different names. Ziphius is near-globally distributed (pics: specimens from Bay of Biscay; NOAA) 2/n 
Bush dog (Speothos venaticus): named as a fossil in 1839 - which explains Speothos, meaning ‘cave wolf’ - and described alive 1843. The same person, Danish naturalist Peter Wilhelm Lund, described the fossil AND living animals, but ... 3/n (pics Attis; Bonne1978; CC BY-SA 3.0)
During the early 1990s, John Blashford-Snell, Rula Lenska and other travelled to Nepal to find and photograph the giant #elephants Raja Gaj and Kansha. They succeeded, and got great images of both animals. They later wrote a book about their adventures... 1/n
The twin-domed skulls and convex trunk bases of these animals - Raja Gaj in particular - led to suggestions (albeit only in talks and popular articles) that they were 'living mammoths' or 'living stegodonts'. I asked Blashford-Snell a few times where these ideas came from... 2/n
They were the result of confusion. The Nepalese giants had been compared by some elephant experts to Elephas hysudricus, an Asian #Pleistocene fossil #elephant with very prominent cranial doming. No deliberate reference to mammoths OR stegodonts! 3/n
Exactly! Humans are now responsible for these extinctions as the planets Apex Predator!
Humans are responsible for most mammalian extinctions for the past 125,000 years. That's an insane amount of time!
The rate at which mammals are going extinct is also going up as we humans continue to change the climate. Polar bears for example, losing their habitat due to the melting ice caps, which we have been causing since the industrial revolution. Also rainforest are being cut down.
#Hobbit-like human ancestors thought to have gone extinct 12,000 years ago might still be hiding away in #Indonesia, an anthropologist has claimed.
Read: weather.com/en-IN/india/sc…
📸: Stuart Hay, ANU
Thread. 👇
Read: weather.com/en-IN/india/sc…
📸: Stuart Hay, ANU
Thread. 👇
In 2004, late anthropologist Mire Morwood discovered #fossils of a tiny species of hominin on Flores, an #Indonesian island.
Named Homo floresiensis & dating back to the late #Pleistocene, this was a contemporary of early modern humans in Southeast Asia.
📸: Peter Brown
Named Homo floresiensis & dating back to the late #Pleistocene, this was a contemporary of early modern humans in Southeast Asia.
📸: Peter Brown
The diminutive hominin bore a resemblance to the australopithecines and even chimps to some extent.
Considering the kind of attention that #LordOfTheRings garnered in the early 2000s, it was only natural that the fun-sized H. floresiensis be nicknamed after #TheHobbit.
Considering the kind of attention that #LordOfTheRings garnered in the early 2000s, it was only natural that the fun-sized H. floresiensis be nicknamed after #TheHobbit.
#Sydney is threatened for the first time as 'catastrophic' #bushfires rage. 350 #koalas have been killed in blazes near #PortMacquarie.
📕 Read more: wef.ch/2X3gmLh
📕 Read more: wef.ch/2X3gmLh
Until a few thousand years ago, an impressive megafauna roamed Australia. Whether those animals went extinct because of humans or past climate change is debated. New study shows that both probably contributed.
#megafauna #Pleistocene
nature.com/articles/s4146…
#megafauna #Pleistocene
nature.com/articles/s4146…
Australia’s bushfires have pumped out half a year's CO2 emissions
» weforum.org/agenda/2019/12…
The extreme weather has prompted renewed calls for #ClimateChange action by the Australian government, by targeting a 26% cut on its heavy dependence on coal for electricity generation.
» weforum.org/agenda/2019/12…
The extreme weather has prompted renewed calls for #ClimateChange action by the Australian government, by targeting a 26% cut on its heavy dependence on coal for electricity generation.
Though I am really glad that #arsenic contamination of #groundwater in India, and specially #WestBengal is getting the attention it deserves, there is a major issue that needs wider discussion.
There is a simplistic argument that arsenic naturally occurs in the #Gangetic belt, the author uses the term “#geological curse”. If this is the case, why is heavy #arsenic contamination being reported from #Jharkhand and #Chattisgarh in Central India?
A possible answer to that may be traced to this MIT paper that was published in @NatureGeosci on #anthropogenic influence on #groundwater #arsenic contamination in #Bangladesh nature.com/articles/ngeo6…
