Paléobiologie

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

Paléobiologie REVUE DE VOLUME 34 (1 ) – 2015 PALÉOBIOLOGIE Une institution Ville de Genève www.museum-geneve.ch Revue de Paléobiologie, Genève (juin 2015) 34 (1): 77-84 ISSN 0253-6730 Observations on the Ursus gr. spelaeus remains from the Pocala cave (Trieste, Friuli Venezia Giulia, N. Italy) Mario ROSSI1 & Giuseppe SANTI2 1 Via Sabotino 5, I-37127 Verona, Italy. E-mail: mario.rush@tiscali.it 2 Dipartimento di Scienze della Terra e dell’Ambiente, Via Ferrata 1, I-27100 Pavia, Italy. E-mail: gsanti@unipv.it Abstract 4 Using the fossils of skulls, P /4, M1 stored in the Geological and Paleontological Museum of the University of Padua (Veneto region), the most modern considerations on cave bear remains from the Pocala cave (Friuli Venezia Giulia region), are advanced. These bears belong to the U. spelaeus Rosenmüller, 1794 species and both the morphological-morphometrical and the morphodynamic characters, seem to be intermediate between those typical of the ancestral forms observed in the “deningeri” bears, and the more modern forms of “ingressus”, as in the other Italian populations recently examined (Covoli di Velo, San Donà di Lamon – Veneto region – and Buco del Frate – Lombardy). Keywords Ursus, Pocala, evolution, Eastern Italy, Pleistocene. 1. INTRODUCTION Rosenmüller, 1794 (Lazzaro, 2003) and subsequently as U. eremus Rabeder et al., 2004 (Calligaris et al., 2006). In the last decade the phylogenetic tree of the cave bear Based on fossils stored in the Geological and has changed deeply, and has been complicated as a Paleontological Museum of the University of Padua consequence of the great amount of new data, especially (Veneto region), the object of our study is to improve in the field of genetics (Hänni et al., 1994; Hofreiter et the knowledge about this population of bears, in order to al., 2002, 2007; Orlando et al., 2002; Knapp et al., 2009; better place them in the evolutionary frame of the Italian Stiller et al., 2010; Baca et al., 2012, 2013) and of the and foreign cave bears. evidence of new discoveries. Since then, the distribution of the cave bear has been extended toward the east to Korea and to Western Siberia as well (Baryshnikov, 2. THE POCALA CAVE 2007; Sher et al., 2011). The most important problems concern the taxonomical The hole of the Pocala (cadastral n. 173/91VG of the Friuli place occupied by some ancestral forms (U. rossicus, Venezia Giulia Region) is surely one of the most famous U. savini, U. deningeri and U. kudarensis) including the caves not only of the Friuli Venezia Giulia region, but possibility that cave bear evolution could be characterized in Europe (Fig. 1A). A great amount of cave bear fossils by a premature division into distinct phylogenetic were discovered at this site during numerous excavations lines. Despite the different interpretation given for the that occurred during the 20th century (Calligaris, 2000; morphological, morphometric and genetic data (such as Lazzaro & Tremul, 2003). Initially Battaglia (1930) intraspecific variability or evidence of a specific division), conducted a detailed search, but then the cave was the great polytypism that globally characterizes the cave abandoned for about 70 years (Lazzaro & Tremul, 2003). bear in both its stratigraphic and geographic significance More recently, Lazzaro & Tremul (2003) provided a has become very clear. detailed description of the cave: the hole is located to the The Pocala population is here re-assessed within this NNW of the Aurisina village (Trieste), its entry opens frame. at 139 m. a.s.l. and it consists of a cavity of 6.5 m in The Pocala bear was the object of previous research width and 2 m height. Debris have certainly blocked (Lazzaro, 2003; Rabeder, 2006 in Calligaris et al., and filled a part of the original area. A corridor of about 2006); initially this bear was classified asUrsus spelaeus 65 m long widens underneath to reach 27 m of width Submitted February 2014, accepted 2015 Editorial handling: J.-C. Castel DOI : 10.5281/zenodo.18901 78 M. ROSSI & G. SANTI Fig. 1: Geographical position (A), a summary stratigraphy of the Pocala cave (B) (after Lazzaro & Tremul, 2003, mod.) and map of the cave (C) (GSSG in: www.gssg.it/wp-content/upload/download/2012/09/pianta-caverna-Pocalajpg, slightly modified). Ursus from the Pocala cave 79 at its extremity. The hole ends with a very large room, 45 m long, 50 m wide and 15 high. Marchesetti (1907) published a synthetic stratigraphy recently redrawn by Calligaris (2000, in: Lazzaro & Tremul, 2003) (Fig. 1B). A detailed map of the cave was recently elaborated by the GSSG (Gruppo Speleologico San Giusto - Trieste) (Fig. 1C). 3. MATERIAL AND METHODS Fig. 2: Comparison of the “Basal Length” in skulls of cave 10 skulls, 9 of which are stored into the Geological and bears from the Pocala (n. 10 specimens) and U. spelaeus Paleontological Museum of the University of Padua and from foreign caves. 1 which is preserved in the Museo di Storia Naturale 4 of Milan, 28 P4, 38 P and 21 M1 compose the samples under study. The parameters of the measurements of the skulls and teeth are those codified by Torres (1988a, b, 4 c, d), and are presented in Table 1. On the P /4 and M1 a morphodynamic analysis was also elaborated using methods of Rabeder (1999) and Grandal d’Anglade & López González (2004). The aim of these analyses is to show the presence of the different morphological types within a studied population. In fact, teeth in the more ancient forms (U. deningeri) were characterized by a very Fig. 3: Comparison of the “Basal Length” in skulls of cave simple chewing surface, bicusps (p4) and tricusps (P4); bears from the Pocala (n. 10 specimens) and U. ingressus successively with the formation of numerous accessorial from foreign caves. cusps and crests, a gradual complication become evident, reaching the maximum complexity in U. ingressus. Both the number and position of these accessorial structures allows for the identification a series of morphotypes; the model that studies their distribution makes it possible to calculate the particular indices (morphodynamic indices) indicative of the evolutionary level of the population. The same is true for M1 as well. For this tooth Grandal d’Anglade & López González (2004) have shown a decrease of the degree of convergence of the cusps from Fig. 4: Comparison of the “Basal Length” in skulls of cave the forms of the Lower Pleistocene to those of the Upper bears from the Pocala (n. 10 specimens) and U. ingres- Pleistocene. The degree of convergence is evaluated sus – U. eremus from Conturines and Ramesch caves. using certain indices: 1) the trigonid convergence index and 2) talonid convergence index. The graph in Figure 5 shows the relationship between the “Basal lenght” and the “Maximum frontal Width” of the 4. MORPHOMETRY skulls of different cave bears species. The points corre- sponding to the Pocala population are placed within the In Figures 2-3 the comparisons between the “Basal range of values of both the U. spelaeus and U. ingressus l enght” of the Pocala population and those of some Euro- species. However, contrarily to these species which con- pean cave bears (U. spelaeus and U. ingressus) are shown. tain specimens of small and larger sizes, the Pocala popu- In another comparison between the Pocala fossils and lation is characterized by peculiar proportions. In fact, bears from the Conturines and Ramesch caves (Fig. 4) we the values of the basal length are similar to those of the can note that the Pocala population is characterized by individuals with a great size with respect to the popula- larger sizes compared to the populations of these two tions referred to and the values of the maximum frontal caves which were inhabited by the species U. ladinicus width decreases faster than in both the U. spe laeus and and U. eremus. The range in size of the Pocala population U. ingressus populations, as can be seen by the regres- is similar to those of typically advanced cave bears and, sion line. more in particular, of both U. spelaeus and U. ingressus. The relationship between the “Basal length” and the The analysis of the absolute length and the length of the “Bizygomatic Width” is shown in Figure 6. Also in this dental row has also reached similar conclusions. case the cloud of the Pocala population falls inside the 80 M. ROSSI & G. SANTI Fig. 5: Relationship between the “Basal Length-Maximum Fig. 7: Relationship between the “Basal Length-Maximum frontal Width” in bears from the Pocala and both the U. occipital Width” in bears from the Pocala and both the ingressus and U. spelaeus. U. ingressus and U. spelaeus. Fig. 6: Relationship between the “Basal Length-Bizygomatic Fig. 8: Relationship between the “Basal Length-Length of Width” in bears from the Pocala and both the dental row” in bears from the Pocala and both the U. ingressus and U. spelaeus. U. ingressus and U. spelaeus. range of the referred populations, but the bizygomatic 5. MORPHODYNAMIC DATA width is always proportionally inferior than that observed for both U. spelaeus and U. ingressus species, as the The graphic in Figure 9 shows the relationship between regression lines show. 4 the P /4 morphodynamic index. The point of the Pocala Figure 7 shows the “Basal Length” against the “Maxi- bears falls next to those of both the Conturines (in which mum occipital Width”. In this case the basal length is also the U. ladinicus holotype is present) and the layers contai- proportionally longer for the Pocala population, but the ning U. eremus of the Herdengelh cave. The values of the difference with the U. ingressus species, is very strong.
Recommended publications
  • Univerzita Karlova V Praze Přírodovědecká Fakulta
    Univerzita Karlova v Praze Přírodovědecká fakulta Katedra zoologie Aneta Marková Stabilní isotopy ve studiu potravy Ursidae, včetně fosilních forem Stable isotopes in study of diet in Ursidae, including fossil taxa Bakalářská práce Školitel: prof. RNDr. Ivan Horáček CSc. Konzultant: Mgr. Jan Wagner Praha, 2011 1 Čestné prohlášení: Prohlašuji, že jsem závěrečnou práci zpracovala samostatně a že jsem uvedla všechny použité informační zdroje a literaturu. Tato práce ani její podstatná část nebyla předložena k získání jiného nebo stejného akademického titulu. V Praze, 18. 8. 2011 ............................................................. Aneta Marková 2 Poděkování: Na tomto místě chci poděkovat svému školiteli prof. RNDr. Ivanu Horáčkovi, CSc a konzultantovi Mgr. Janu Wagnerovi především za výběr tématu bakalářské práce a pomoc při jejím zpracování. Děkuji také svým nejbližším za jejich podporu. 3 Abstrakt Složení potravy u zástupců čeledi medvědovitých (Ursidae) je často diskutovaným tématem. Dodnes však panují určité nejistoty o trofické úrovni některých fosilních skupin. Velmi užitečnou metodou, která napomáhá k určení trofické úrovně u fosilních druhů medvědů a k určení relativního zastoupení rostlinné a živočišné složky potravy u druhů recentních, je analýza stabilních izotopů. Tato práce shrnuje poznatky o metodických přístupech a možnostech využití stabilních izotopů 13C a 15N ve studiu potravní ekologie medvědovitých. Výsledky analýz stabilních izotopů jsou prezentovány spolu s výsledky získanými jinými metodami. Pozornost je věnována skupinám, pro které existují relevantní izotopová data, se zvláštním zaměřením na medvědy jeskynní, jejichž trofická úroveň je v závěru zhodnocena za pomoci analýz stabilních izotopů i v kontextu evolučním a nutričním. Klíčová slova: stabilní isotopy, potrava, potravní ekologie, Ursidae Abstract Composition of food of members of the family Ursidae is often discussed topic.
    [Show full text]
  • A B S T Ra C T S O F T H E O Ra L and Poster Presentations
    Abstracts of the oral and poster presentations (in alphabetic order) see Addenda, p. 271 11th ICAZ International Conference. Paris, 23-28 August 2010 81 82 11th ICAZ International Conference. Paris, 23-28 August 2010 ABRAMS Grégory1, BONJEAN ABUHELALEH Bellal1, AL NAHAR Maysoon2, Dominique1, Di Modica Kévin1 & PATOU- BERRUTI Gabriele Luigi Francesco, MATHIS Marylène2 CANCELLIERI Emanuele1 & THUN 1, Centre de recherches de la grotte Scladina, 339D Rue Fond des Vaux, 5300 Andenne, HOHENSTEIN Ursula1 Belgique, gregoryabrams@yahoo.fr; scladina@swing.be ; kevin_dimodica@yahoo.fr 2, Institut de Paléontologie Humaine, Département Préhistoire du Muséum National d’Histoire 1, Department of Biology and Evolution, University of Ferrara, Corso Ercole I d’Este 32, Ferrara Naturelle, 1 Rue René Panhard, 75013 Paris, France, patmath@mnhn.fr (FE: 44100), Italy, bhlbll@unife.it 2, Department of Archaeology, University of Jordan. Amman 11942 Jordan, maysnahar@gmail. com Les os brûlés de l’ensemble sédimentaire 1A de Scladina (Andenne, Belgique) : apports naturels ou restes de foyer Study of Bone artefacts and use techniques from the Neo- néandertalien ? lithic Jordanian site; Tell Abu Suwwan (PPNB-PN) L’ensemble sédimentaire 1A de la grotte Scladina, daté par 14C entre In this paper we would like to present the experimental study car- 40 et 37.000 B.P., recèle les traces d’une occupation par les Néan- ried out in order to reproduce the bone artifacts coming from the dertaliens qui contient environ 3.500 artefacts lithiques ainsi que Neolithic site Tell Abu Suwwan-Jordan. This experimental project plusieurs milliers de restes fauniques, attribués majoritairement au aims to complete the archaeozoological analysis of the bone arti- Cheval pour les herbivores.
    [Show full text]
  • Heavy Reliance on Plants for Romanian Cave Bears Evidenced by Amino Acid Nitrogen Isotope Analysis Yuichi I
    www.nature.com/scientificreports OPEN Heavy reliance on plants for Romanian cave bears evidenced by amino acid nitrogen isotope analysis Yuichi I. Naito 1,2*, Ioana N. Meleg3*, Marius Robu 3, Marius Vlaicu3, Dorothée G. Drucker 4, Christoph Wißing1, Michael Hofreiter5, Axel Barlow 5,6 & Hervé Bocherens 1,4 Heavy reliance on plants is rare in Carnivora and mostly limited to relatively small species in subtropical settings. The feeding behaviors of extinct cave bears living during Pleistocene cold periods at middle latitudes have been intensely studied using various approaches including isotopic analyses of fossil collagen. In contrast to cave bears from all other regions in Europe, some individuals from Romania show exceptionally high δ15N values that might be indicative of meat consumption. Herbivory on plants with high δ15N values cannot be ruled out based on this method, however. Here we apply an approach using the δ15N values of individual amino acids from collagen that ofsets the baseline δ15N variation among environments. The analysis yielded strong signals of reliance on plants for Romanian cave bears based on the δ15N values of glutamate and phenylalanine. These results could suggest that the high variability in bulk collagen δ15N values observed among cave bears in Romania refects niche partitioning but in a general trophic context of herbivory. Bears represent the largest terrestrial members within the Carnivora alive today and the vast majority of them have carnivorous or omnivorous feeding habits. Until around 25,000 years ago, the coldest period in the Pleistocene, additional, now extinct bear species were living1–4, among which the so-called cave bears, a very large type of bear that formed the sister lineage of extant brown bears and polar bears (e.g., ref.
    [Show full text]
  • The Cave Bears (Ursidae, Mammalia) from Steigelfadbalm Near Vitznau (Canton of Lucerne, Switzerland)
    Acta zoologica cracoviensia, 60(2) 2017 ISSN 2299-6060, e-ISSN 2300-0163 Kraków, 29 December, 2017 https://doi.org/10.3409/azc.60_2.35 Proceedings of the 22 nd ICBS International Cave Bear Symposium 21-25.09.2016, Kletno, Poland The cave bears (Ursidae, Mammalia) from Steigelfadbalm near Vitznau (Canton of Lucerne, Switzerland) Christine FRISCHAUF, Ebbe NIELSEN and Gernot RABEDER Received: 26 June 2017. Accepted: 1 December 2017. Available online: 29 December 2017. FRISCHAUF C., NIELSEN E., RABEDER G. 2017. The cave bears (Ursidae, Mammalia) from Steigelfadbalm near Vitznau (Canton of Lucerne, Switzerland). Acta zool. cracov., 60(2): 35-57. Abstract. The fossil vertebrate remains from the “Steigelfadbalm” cave near Vitznau by Lake Lucerne, which are stored in the Cantonal Archaeological Survey of Lucerne, were subject to a scientific analysis at the Institute for Palaeontology at the University of Vienna. The fossils were recovered during excavations which took place between 1913 and 1937, but had not yet been scientifically analysed. The studies about the morphology and dimen- sions of the teeth and metapodial bones clarified the systematic position of the cave bears. All other remains originate from wild and domestic animals from the Holocene. The basal fossiliferous layers are mixed with younger sediments by bioturbation. One focus of the investigation was the critical evaluation of the bone fragments, including a human manu- brium, interpreted by the excavator as Palaeolithic tools. Key words: Alpine bear cave, Ursus ingressus, Middle Wurmian, morphotypes, locomo- tion versus dietary habits, extinction pattern, “bone-tools”. * Christine FRISCHAUF, Gernot RABEDER, Institute of Palaeontology, University Vienna, Geozentrum, UZA II, Althanstraße 14, A1090 Wien, Austria.
    [Show full text]
  • 10.Stiller Et Al. Quatern.2013
    Quaternary International xxx (2013) 1e8 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Quaternary International journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/quaint Mitochondrial DNA diversity and evolution of the Pleistocene cave bear complex Mathias Stiller a,b,1, Martyna Molak c,1, Stefan Prost b,d,e, Gernot Rabeder f, Gennady Baryshnikov g, Wilfried Rosendahl h, Susanne Münzel i, Hervé Bocherens j, Aurora Grandal-d’Anglade k, Brigitte Hilpert l, Mietje Germonpré m, Oleh Stasyk n, Ron Pinhasi o,p, Andrea Tintori q, Nadin Rohland r, Elmira Mohandesan s, Simon Y.W. Ho c, Michael Hofreiter b,t,*,1, Michael Knapp b,d,u,**,1 a Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of California Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA b Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Deutscher Platz 6, D-04103 Leipzig, Germany c School of Biological Sciences, University of Sydney, New South Wales 2006, Australia d Allan Wilson Centre for Molecular Ecology and Evolution, Department of Anatomy, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand e Department of Integrative Biology, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA f Department of Palaeontology, University of Vienna, 1090 Vienna, Austria g Zoological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences, 199034 St. Petersburg, Russia h Reiss-Engelhorn-Museen, Department for World Cultures and Environment, 68159 Mannheim, Germany i Institute for Archaeological Sciences, Archaeozoology, University of Tübingen, 72070 Tübingen, Germany j Department of Geosciences, Biogeology, University of Tübingen, 72074 Tübingen, Germany k Instituto Universitario de Xeoloxía, Universidade da Coruña, 15081 A Coruña, Spain l Geo-Center of Northern Bavaria, Research Group Palaeontology, Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nürnberg, 91054 Erlangen, Germany m Operational Direction ‘Earth and History of Life’, Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences, 1000 Brussels, Belgium n Institute of Cell Biology, National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Drahomanov Str.
    [Show full text]
  • Isotopic Evidence for Dietary Ecology of Cave Lion (Panthera Spelaea
    Isotopic evidence for dietary ecology of cave lion (Panthera spelaea) in North-Western Europe: Prey choice, competition and implications for extinction Hervé Bocherens, Dorothée G. Drucker, Dominique Bonjean, Anne Bridault, Nicolas Conard, Christophe Cupillard, Mietje Germonpré, Markus Höneisen, Suzanne Münzel, Hannes Napierala, et al. To cite this version: Hervé Bocherens, Dorothée G. Drucker, Dominique Bonjean, Anne Bridault, Nicolas Conard, et al.. Isotopic evidence for dietary ecology of cave lion (Panthera spelaea) in North-Western Europe: Prey choice, competition and implications for extinction. Quaternary International, Elsevier, 2011, 245 (2), pp.249-261. 10.1016/j.quaint.2011.02.023. hal-01673488 HAL Id: hal-01673488 https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01673488 Submitted on 28 Oct 2019 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. Isotopic evidence for dietary ecology of cave lion (Panthera spelaea) in North-Western Europe: Prey choice, competition and implications for extinction Hervé Bocherens a,*, Dorothée G. Drucker a,b, Dominique
    [Show full text]
  • Retreat and Extinction of the Late Pleistocene Cave Bear (Ursus Spelaeus Sensu Lato)
    Sci Nat (2016) 103:92 DOI 10.1007/s00114-016-1414-8 ORIGINAL PAPER Retreat and extinction of the Late Pleistocene cave bear (Ursus spelaeus sensu lato) Mateusz Baca1,2 & Danijela Popović3 & Krzysztof Stefaniak4 & Adrian Marciszak4 & Mikołaj Urbanowski5 & Adam Nadachowski6 & Paweł Mackiewicz7 Received: 8 July 2016 /Revised: 18 September 2016 /Accepted: 20 September 2016 # The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com Abstract The cave bear (Ursus spelaeus sensu lato) is a typical decrease in the cave bear records with cooling indicate that the representative of Pleistocene megafauna which became extinct at drastic climatic changes were responsible for its extinction. the end of the Last Glacial. Detailed knowledge of cave bear Climate deterioration lowered vegetation productivity, on which extinction could explain this spectacular ecological transforma- the cave bear strongly depended as a strict herbivore. The distri- tion. The paper provides a report on the youngest remains of the bution of the last cave bear records in Europe suggests that this cave bear dated to 20,930 ± 140 14C years before present (BP). animal was vanishing by fragmentation into subpopulations oc- Ancient DNA analyses proved its affiliation to the Ursus cupying small habitats. One of them was the Kraków- ingressus haplotype. Using this record and 205 other dates, we Częstochowa Upland in Poland, where we discovered the latest determined, following eight approaches, the extinction time of record of the cave bear and also two other, younger than 25,000 this mammal at 26,100–24,300 cal. years BP. The time is only 14C years BP.
    [Show full text]
  • Age Re-Assessment of the Cave Bear Assemblage from Uråłilor Cave
    International Journal of Speleology 45 (2) 123-133 Tampa, FL (USA) May 2016 Available online at scholarcommons.usf.edu/ijs International Journal of Speleology Off icial Journal of Union Internationale de Spéléologie Age re-assessment of the cave bear assemblage from Urşilor Cave, north-western Romania Marius Robu “Emil Racoviţă” Institute of Speleology, Romanian Academy, Calea 13 Septembrie, 13, 050711, Bucharest, Romania Abstract: The most common methods used for assessing the relative age of a cave bear bone 4 assemblage are the P /4 index (morphodynamic index of the cave bear fourth premolar), the K-index, and the Index of Plumpness (both used for cave bear’s 2nd metatarsal). Preliminary work on these indexes, for Urşilor Cave (NW Romania), has indicated one of the youngest European cave bear populations. As the number of extracted fossil bones from the palaeontological excavation increased recently, a re-assessment of the of the age of the cave bear assemblage is necessary. 206 cave bear fourth lower and upper premolars 4 and 587 metapodials were analyzed. The P /4 morphodynamic index, the K-index and the Index of Plumpness were calculated for the local MIS 3 cave bear bone assemblage. The results of the three indices have lower values when compared with the previously obtained for the same site and respect the subsequent radiometric ages (ca. 47-39 ky BP). However, 4 the results for P /4 morphodynamic index, K-index, and Index of Plumpness are of lesser relevance when used to assess the relative age of MIS 3 cave bear bone assemblages. All three methods require caution when applied and interpreted on short time intervals and on smaller geographic areas.
    [Show full text]
  • Extinctions of Late Ice Age Cave Bears As a Result of Climate/Habitat Change and Large Carnivore Lion/Hyena/Wolf Predation Stress in Europe
    Hindawi Publishing Corporation ISRN Zoology Volume 2013, Article ID 138319, 25 pages http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2013/138319 Research Article Extinctions of Late Ice Age Cave Bears as a Result of Climate/Habitat Change and Large Carnivore Lion/Hyena/Wolf Predation Stress in Europe Cajus G. Diedrich Paleologic, Private Research Institute, Petra Bezruce 96, CZ-26751 Zdice, Czech Republic Correspondence should be addressed to Cajus G. Diedrich; cdiedri@gmx.net Received 16 September 2012; Accepted 5 October 2012 Academic Editors: L. Kaczmarek and C.-F. Weng Copyright © 2013 Cajus G. Diedrich. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Predation onto cave bears (especially cubs) took place mainly by lion Panthera leo spelaea (Goldfuss),asnocturnalhuntersdeep in the dark caves in hibernation areas. Several cave bear vertebral columns in Sophie’s Cave have large carnivore bite damages. Different cave bear bones are chewed or punctured. Those lets reconstruct carcass decomposition and feeding technique caused only/mainlybyIceAgespottedhyenasCrocuta crocuta spelaea, which are the only of all three predators that crushed finally the long bones. Both large top predators left large tooth puncture marks on the inner side of cave bear vertebral columns, presumably a result of feeding first on their intestines/inner organs. Cave bear hibernation areas, also demonstrated in the Sophie’s Cave, were far from the cave entrances, carefully chosen for protection against the large predators. The predation stress must have increased on the last and larger cave bear populations of U.
    [Show full text]
  • Radiocarbon, Ancient DNA and Stable Isotope Evidence from a Late Cave
    CORE Metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk Provided by Archive Ouverte en Sciences de l'Information et de la Communication The last of its kind? Radiocarbon, ancient DNA and stable isotope evidence from a late cave bear (Ursus spelaeus ROSENMÜLLER, 1794) from Rochedane (France) Hervé Bocherens, Anne Bridault, Dorothée G. Drucker, Michael Hofreiter, Suzanne Münzel, Mathias Stiller, Plicht Johannes van Der To cite this version: Hervé Bocherens, Anne Bridault, Dorothée G. Drucker, Michael Hofreiter, Suzanne Münzel, et al.. The last of its kind? Radiocarbon, ancient DNA and stable isotope evidence from a late cave bear (Ursus spelaeus ROSENMÜLLER, 1794) from Rochedane (France). Quaternary International, Elsevier, 2014, 339-340, pp.179-188. 10.1016/j.quaint.2013.05.021. hal-01673468 HAL Id: hal-01673468 https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01673468 Submitted on 28 Oct 2019 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. The last of its kind? Radiocarbon, ancient DNA and stable isotope evidence from a late cave bear (Ursus spelaeus ROSENMÜLLER, 1794) from Rochedane (France) Hervé Bocherens a,*, Anne Bridault b, Dorothée G. Drucker a, Michael Hofreiter c, Susanne C.
    [Show full text]
  • Geol. Quart. 64 (4) Internet
    Geo log i cal Quar terly, 2020, 64 (4): 876–897 DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7306/gq.1565 The his tory of bears (Ursidae, Carnivora, Mammalia) from Silesia (south ern Po land) and the neigh bour ing ar eas Adrian MARCISZAK1, * and Grzegorz LIPECKI2 1 Uni ver sity of Wroc³aw, De part ment of Palaeozoology, In sti tute of En vi ron men tal Bi ol ogy, Fac ulty of Bi o log i cal Sci ences, Sienkiewicza 21, 50-335 Wroc³aw, Po land 2 Pol ish Acad emy of Sciences, In sti tute of System at ics and Evo lu tion of An i mals, S³awkowska 17, 31-016 Kraków, Po land Marciszak, A., Lipecki, G., 2020. The history of bears (Ursidae, Carnivora, Mammalia) from Silesia (south ern Poland) and the neigh bour ing ar eas. Geo log i cal Quar terly, 64 (4): 876–897, doi: 10.7306/gq.1565 As so ci ate Ed i tor: Micha³ Zatoñ Re vi sion of the Silesian bear fauna, based on ma te rial from 152 sites, mainly cave and karstic lo cal i ties, and also ar chae o- log i cal and open-air sites, shows the presence of 13 forms and spe cies. These re cords en com pass the last 16.5 Ma and may be di vided into five main morphophyletic groups. The old est bears, rep resented by the genera Ballusia and Ursavus, are dated to 16.5–11 Ma, and belonged to the stem forms of the subfamily Ursinae.
    [Show full text]
  • Ancient DNA and Dating of Cave Bear Remains from Niedzwiedzia Cave Suggest Early Appearance of Ursus Ingressus in Sudetes
    Quaternary International 339-340 (2014) 217e223 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Quaternary International journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/quaint Ancient DNA and dating of cave bear remains from Niedzwiedzia Cave suggest early appearance of Ursus ingressus in Sudetes Mateusz Baca a,*,Pawe1 Mackiewicz h,*, Anna Stankovic b,e, Danijela Popovic c, Krzysztof Stefaniak d, Kinga Czarnogórska e, Adam Nadachowski f, Micha1 Ga˛siorowski g, Helena Hercman g, Piotr Weglenski b,c a Center for Precolumbian Studies, University of Warsaw, Krakowskie Przedmiescie 26/28, 00-927 Warsaw, Poland b Institute of Biochemistry and Biophysics, Polish Academy of Science, Pawinskiego 5a, 02-106 Warsaw, Poland c Centre of New Technologies, University of Warsaw, Miecznikowa 1, 02-096 Warsaw, Poland d Department of Evolutionary Biology and Ecology, University of Wrocław, Sienkiewicza 21, Wrocław 50-335, Poland e Institute of Genetics and Biotechnology, University of Warsaw, Pawinskiego 5A, 02-106 Warsaw, Poland f Institute of Systematics and Evolution of Animals, Polish Academy of Sciences, Sławkowska 17, 31-016 Cracow, Poland g Institute of Geological Sciences, Polish Academy of Sciences, Twarda 51/55, 00-818 Warsaw, Poland h Department of Genomics, Faculty of Biotechnology, University of Wrocław, Przybyszewskiego 63/77, 51-148 Wrocław, Poland article info abstract Article history: The migration of Ursus ingressus from Southern to Western Europe, where it replaced native forms of Available online 19 September 2013 Ursus spelaeus, is well documented. However, its occurrence in Central and Eastern European countries is unexplored. We have characterized the cave bear population inhabiting the Sudetes Mountains during the Late Pleistocene. DNA analyses were performed on 39 cave bear specimens from the Niedzwiedzia Cave.
    [Show full text]