Late Pleistocene extinctions in Australia

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Glossary

Late Pleistocene era: 50,000-10,000 years ago.

Last Glacial Maximum (LGM): 26,500 - 20,000 years ago.

Humans first arrival in Australia: predicted to be from 60,000 - 48,000 years ago.

Mass extinctions in Australia: predicted to be from 26,000 - 15,000 years ago.

Megafauna: mammals weighing over 44kg that became extinct during the late Pleistocene.

'Mosaic nutrient' hypothesis: claims that climate change instigated the decreased vegetative growing seasons and plant diversity, and increasing the plant anti-herbivore defenses, leading to the loss of megaherbivores.

'Habitat loss' hypothesis: claims that as climate changed, species lost their habitats because certain plants couldn’t survive in the altered environmental parameters.

'Self organised instability' hypothesis: claims the complex network of interactions in the ecosystems can mean that small changes in the climate can be amplified throughout the ecosystem to bring about big changes in species composition.

Overkill hypotheses: death rates from hunting exceeded the species natural birth rates, hence decreasing the species number critically.

'Blitzkrieg': process of rapid mass extinction over 500-1000 years due to human overhunting.

'Keystone megaherbivore' hypothesis: loss of habitat and increased hunting leads to altering megaherbivores species composition and ecosystem collapse.

'Co-evolutionary disequilibrium' hypothesis: the rapid climate transition caused the disruption of highly interactive and intricate ecological systems leading extinction.

Hyper-disease: the introduction of virulent diseases.

Prey-switching: as climate change or human impacts saw the reduction in preferred prey, nonhuman carnivores had to switch to alternative prey.

Late Pleistocene extinctions in Australia - human or fate?

Saturday, 7 January 2012

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