Climate Not to be Blamed For Extinction of Large Mammals

Humans are the main culprits behind the mass extinction of large mammals all over the world during the last Ice Age, a new study reveals.

It's been over 50 years that scientists have been debating on the cause that led to the mass extinction of the megafauna during and years after the Ice Age.  Researchers at the University of Aarhus have solved this mystery on the basis of the first global analysis.

The global analysis of the extinction of large mammals during the last 100,000 years revealed that climate is not be blamed for the disappearance of the mammals but rather human activities are the key reason behind it.

There were two theories proposed for extinction of large animals. One was climate change and the other was overkilling.

According to the theory, due to the rapid change in the climate the species had no potential to find suitable habitats as a result they were gradually wiped out. Since the last Ice Age was in a long series of Ice Ages, it is doubtful that extinction of large animals did not occur during the earlier ones.

The other theory states that modern man moved from Africa to other regions of the world. And this led to extermination of large animal species. This was because of either loss of prey that was taken by humans or they were hunted down.

 To reveal the original cause, the researchers produced the first global analysis and fine grained mapping of large mammals that existed 132,000-1,000 years ago.  They noticed that a total of 177 species of large mammals disappeared during this period. 

Africa lost near 18 species, Europe lost 19 species and Asia lost 38 species.  A greater number of large mammals disappeared from South America i.e. 62 species, 43 species were lost from North America and Australia lost 26 species.

"We consistently find very large rates of extinction in areas where there had been no contact between wildlife and primitive human races, and which were suddenly confronted by fully developed modern humans. In general, at least 30% of the large species of animals disappeared from all such areas," says Professor Jens-Christian Svenning, Aarhus University.

The geographical analysis claims that humans were the main cause of the loss of most of the large animals.

The finding was documented in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.