African megafauna in North America

[Elfdart]

Can we get back to the subject of me shitting my pa-... I mean 'Can elephants survive snow?'

Yes, they can. Not that they would have to worry too much about ice and snow in the Southwest.

[Elfdart]

The whole idea that the small numbers of people who came to North America >10,000 years ago killed off the megafauna has always seemed fishy to me.

Humans have lived much longer (and in much greater numbers) among similar megafauna in Africa and only in the last 200 years or so have they had much effect.

Remember that humans are indigenous to Africa, but not to America. Some theories about the superfauna extinctions in North America attribute it to humans being carriers of diseases that the American superfauna had no resistance to

In that case, they wouldn't have been any more of a menace than any other mammal that followed the same path.

And the death of the megafauna in Australia has been attributed to the arrival of humans on the continent there as well, with most of the megafauna becoming extinct within 10,000 years of their arrival. At that time, the arrival of humans in a new environment was no different from the introduction of any other feral species, and we know how destructive that can be.

But humans aren't the only animals to make the trip. I'm not totally dismissing the idea of humans playing a role, but to think tiny numbers of humans killed off the megafauna is like blaming lead poisoning for the fall of Rome. It might have been a very small part -possibly the straw that broke the mammoth's back- but not a major cause, IMO.

[General Trelane (Retired)]

To say that a shift in cultural mindset would be required is a huge understatement. As mentioned before, the reintroduction of wolves to Wyoming is a clear demonstration.

Other examples include bears and cougars; as the populations of these native predators increase, more confrontations with humans occur, and people are NOT taking the necessary precautions. The death of a female hiker at Canmore, Alberta, is a prime example of bear-human interaction.

Similarly, cougars are expanding their range such that sightings are becoming more and more common as far out as a five-hour drive east of the foothills. And though I have yet to hear of any unpleasant confrontations, rural residents are getting nervous! Some of them keep a rifle at hand even within their farmyard.

So what do these scientists think is going to happen if we put lions and cheetahs on our prairies?

My own knee-jerk reaction aside, I'd still like to hear their hour-long presentation. . .

[SyntaxVorlon]

There's a preserve in former Ohio Coal country called the Wilds, where a lot of African large animals are kept, and all of the the Columbus Zoo's Giraffe population.

[Lusankya]

But humans aren't the only animals to make the trip. I'm not totally dismissing the idea of humans playing a role, but to think tiny numbers of humans killed off the megafauna is like blaming lead poisoning for the fall of Rome. It might have been a very small part -possibly the straw that broke the mammoth's back- but not a major cause, IMO.

I can agree with that for mammoths and the like, but not for the megafauna in Australia. They were there, happily sitting on their big island with no natural predators save the sun and the rain, when along came these funny naked monkeys with pointed sticks. Basically they were hunted to extinction.

[Elfdart]

I thought Australia had marsupial versions of dogs and leopards, carnivorous kangaroos and giant monitors.

[LadyTevar]

Nope. North America still has as much forest today as it did about 100 years ago. A lot of the credit goes to the conservationists of that time, but some also goes to the industry itself. The lumber industry survives on their ability to produce lumber, so it is in their best interest to make sure their supply does not disappear. How do they do this? By planting more trees. Wood is a renewable resource, after all. Most wood we buy at the lumber yard are taken from trees grown in tree farms specifically for that purpose.

100 years ago we were trying to cut down every damn tree in creation. If you compared today's forest to that of 400 years ago, it would be no where near equal.

There is only one stand of Virgin Forest left in WV. The rest of the state was damn-near clear-cut from the 1890s to the 1920s.

[Elfdart]

Here's a website with great artwork by Laura Cunningham depicting what the Southwest looked like >10,000 years ago:

http://www.atomictoadranch.com/painting/pleistoc.htm

[wolveraptor]

I thought Australia had marsupial versions of dogs and leopards, carnivorous kangaroos and giant monitors.

Let's just say that compared to todays lions and tigers, they sucked major ass. Ancient Australia's marsupial lion, for example, had neither the size nor the metabolism for lightning fast attacks like the lion against the water buffalo. Though to its credit, it was powerfully built, like a bear. However, like most marsupials, it had a slow metabolism, a powerful bite (more than twice that of the spotted hyena) and was a rather weak contender in the global predatory pissing contest. Its primary prey was thought to be a 3 ton marsupial, the largest ever, the preferred targets being young/injured, or even pouched babies.

The giant monitor myth arose from an over-exaggeration Australia's barren-ness. It was thought that giant reptiles would fill the top niche in Australia, needing less calories than their warm-blooded kin. In reality, Megalania, the giant monitor, was no bigger than a Komodo dragon. Which is still pretty damn big, at 200-300 lbs.

Linky linky

[ArmorPierce]

The giant monitor myth arose from an over-exaggeration Australia's barren-ness. It was thought that giant reptiles would fill the top niche in Australia, needing less calories than their warm-blooded kin. In reality, Megalania, the giant monitor, was no bigger than a Komodo dragon. Which is still pretty damn big, at 200-300 lbs.

Stats I see puts Megalania at twice the size of Komodo dragons.

[Lusankya]

I thought Australia had marsupial versions of dogs and leopards, carnivorous kangaroos and giant monitors.

There isn't a large population of carnivores on the mainland.

Most of our dangerous creatures are the type that hide in dark places and then poison you.

[Elfdart]

I thought Australia had marsupial versions of dogs and leopards, carnivorous kangaroos and giant monitors.

Let's just say that compared to todays lions and tigers, they sucked major ass. Ancient Australia's marsupial lion, for example, had neither the size nor the metabolism for lightning fast attacks like the lion against the water buffalo. Though to its credit, it was powerfully built, like a bear. However, like most marsupials, it had a slow metabolism, a powerful bite (more than twice that of the spotted hyena) and was a rather weak contender in the global predatory pissing contest. Its primary prey was thought to be a 3 ton marsupial, the largest ever, the preferred targets being young/injured, or even pouched babies.

But it's all relative. Lions are fast, agile and powerful because most of their prey are, too. The marsupial version (IIRC was about the size of a leopard or cougar) might not have been because its prey wasn't.

The giant monitor myth arose from an over-exaggeration Australia's barren-ness. It was thought that giant reptiles would fill the top niche in Australia, needing less calories than their warm-blooded kin. In reality, Megalania, the giant monitor, was no bigger than a Komodo dragon. Which is still pretty damn big, at 200-300 lbs.

Linky linky

Isn't it true that a lot of the small-to-medium predator niches in Australia were (and sometimes still are) filled by various monitor lizards, where in the rest of the world they are filled by badgers, weasels, skunks, civets, et al?

The link is pretty good, but the scientists are mistaken about sabretooth cats. They were not lions or tigers with bigger canines. They were not very fast, except maybe for a very short lunge. They were purely stalkers who used their mass to bowl over and/ or grapple with big, slow herbivores like mammoths, mastodons with the odd camel or longhorn bison who was too slow or injured. If Thylacaleo was as heavily built as they describe, he most likely would have hunted in much the same way, only without the sabre teeth. Looking at the animal's teeth, it appears that they would grapple or bowl over their victims and start tearing away flesh while the animal was still alive, since they had no killer canines to quickly finish their prey (like cats do) nor the marathon runner's build of dogs to wear out their prey in a long chase. It looks like Thylacaleo's carnassial teeth tried to fill in the gap by growing larger at the front (I'm going by the artist's restoration.). With a low metabolism and lack of large prey, the marsupial lion was adapted just fine for its time and place.

[wolveraptor]

The quick ambush requires speed, even from a massive Smilodon, something Australia's counterpart didn't have. Sabretoothes were big, but not cumbersomely so. After all, no cat can actually grapple with mamoth. The cat tried to slash the elephant's belly and ribs with its massive teeth (which were quite fragile). There is some evidence it may have hunted in packs. I could see a group of Smilodon repeatedly leaping at an injured mammoth, tearing it several new belly-buttons. In fact, I don't see how a sabretooth could've attacked a full-grown mammoth any other way.

[CaptainChewbacca]

I think it would be cool if this stuff got going, and then they finally got around to cloning a wooly mammoth. Then we could bring them back to North America, and I could get a mammoth-hair jacket finally.

[WyrdNyrd]

I'm surprised no-one's mentioned the Tiger Kills Teen thread here yet.

That's what you get when pampered, shit-for-brains city-folk encounter African predators.

I'm pampered city-folk myself. There are no lions on the streets of Joburg, but even if there were, I sure-as-fuck wouldn't try to pet them.

[Elheru Aran]

I'm surprised no-one's mentioned the Tiger Kills Teen thread here yet.

That's what you get when pampered, shit-for-brains city-folk encounter African predators.

I'm pampered city-folk myself. There are no lions on the streets of Joburg, but even if there were, I sure-as-fuck wouldn't try to pet them.

Minor nitpick. Tigers are *not* African; they're strictly Asian. However, your point is quite correct. It's not only the city people that we have to worry about either, as I pointed out earlier-- there's also Joe Redneck wanting a nice trophy so he can show off his cojones to Joe Bob and Bubba....

[WyrdNyrd]

Minor nitpick. Tigers are *not* African

Good god, I can't believe I fucked that up! Guess my brain was in neutral

This is especially embarassing for me, because I delight in laughing at idiots (usually American) who say things like "This is Africa, man! There's lions and tigers and bears!" (One of the contestants on Survivor Africa.) We don't have bears here either.

[wolveraptor]

Bears used to exist in Africa, till whiteys hunted them away. The Atlas bear, I believe, inhabited Meditteranean Africa.

But all of this is a major departation from the topic at hand.