What is the secret of the extinction of the king of giant monkeys? Know how the unsolved mystery was solved in research.
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,Kira Westaway, Associate Professor, School of Natural Sciences, Macquarie University and Marion BaileyPhD Candidate, Geoarchaeology, Southern Cross University)
Sydney, mammoths are usually associated with dinosaurs, hairy elephants or mysterious mammoths. But if you trace back the human lineage you’ll find a very distant relative who stood three meters tall and weighed around 250 kilograms. This was Gigantopithecus blacki, the most powerful of all primates and one of paleontology’s greatest unsolved mysteries.
Despite living for approximately two million years in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region of southern China, the entire species is represented in the fossil record by only a few thousand teeth and four jaw bones. Nothing below the neck. Moreover, its mysterious disappearance from the fossil record occurred at a time when other species were flourishing. Where did these giant creatures go and how did they fall? Since 2015, a team of Chinese, Australian and American scientists have been searching for this powerful animal in specific areas of southern China. Our findings are published today in Nature and reveal a story of climate, stress and vulnerability.
Extensive exploration and excavation in hundreds of caves over a five-year period has been limited to evidence from 22 caves in two regions of Guangxi and Chongzuo, near the Vietnamese border, and the Bubing Basin, near Nanning. Eleven of these caves Yes. Blackie and the other eleven do not although all date to the same time..Our team applied several dating techniques to the sediments from the caves: luminescence dating of feldspar (a common rock-forming mineral), electron spin dating of quartz resonance dating, and stalagmites and similar deposits, as well as uranium series dating of fossils. In total we reached an astonishing 157 radiometric ages.
We used these data sets to establish that G. When did blackie disappear from the fossil record, so that its “extinction window” can be defined. This window helped us set a target for a certain period of time to closely observe environmental changes.
Next, we looked at eight sources of environmental and behavioral evidence, including ancient pollen grains, bones of other animals, and microscopic details in sediments.
In addition, we have G. A lot of information was obtained from Blackie’s teeth – from isotopic signatures, trace elements and wear patterns on the teeth’s surface. This evidence may indicate diet, migration patterns, habitat preferences, diversity of food sources and stress.
This data represents the largest collection of well-dated evidence for a great ape and is supported by well-documented environmental and behavioral changes for the first time. This makes G. Reveals the rise and fall of Blackie.
Surprisingly, G. blackie became extinct between 295,000 and 215,000 years ago, much later than previously thought. Before this time, Mr. Blackie flourished in a rich and diverse forest.
But between 600,000 and 300,000 years ago the environment became more variable. The increase in the strength of the seasons caused changes in the structure of forest plant communities. By 200,000 years ago, forests began to degrade.
Despite being close relatives of G. blackii, orangutans were able to adapt their size, behavior, and habitat preferences to accommodate these forest changes. Their fossils demonstrate a flexible and balanced diet with very little stress during this period.
But Mr. Blackie made the fatal mistake of relying on less nutritious food such as twigs and bark when his preferred food sources such as fruit-bearing plants were unavailable. This meant that the great apes had less food diversity than the more agile orangutans. Their less mobile body size limited their geographic range in finding food.
Surprisingly, during this period G. Blackie’s body size also increased, exacerbating food source problems and causing extreme long-term stress on the species. This stress can be seen in the trace element mapping of their teeth, which provides information about species on the brink of extinction.
As a direct result, G. Blackie’s numbers declined as the species was placed under increasing environmental stress.
It appears that because of such specialized food and habitat preferences, G. Blackie was sensitive to environmental and habitat changes. Its size and food preferences hindered its adaptation compared to more agile and mobile species like the orangutan.
Yes. Blackie’s story is a lesson in extinction – how some species are more equipped to survive change and others more vulnerable. This is a lesson we should adopt given the looming threat of a sixth mass extinction event.
Trying to understand past extinctions is a good starting point for understanding primate resilience. This may give clues to the fate of other large animals, both in the past and future.
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