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Prehistoric Extinctions on Islands and Continents

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Book cover Extinctions in Near Time

Part of the book series: Advances in Vertebrate Paleobiology ((AIVP,volume 2))

Abstract

Geological extinction of a continental megafauna of Holarctic mammoths, American ground sloths, and Australian diprotodonts, to name a few mammalian examples, rivals pulsing ice sheets and fluctuating sea levels in being a hallmark of the Quaternary. To these more familiar examples of late Quaternary extinction (LQE), younger fossils recently recovered from oceanic islands, including bird and land snail taxa from the Pacific and various endemic terrestrial vertebrates from the Caribbean, add many thousands of species and endemic populations to the extinction list. Apart from loss of a few pinnipeds and sirenians (large coastal or estuarine mammals), the LQE was strictly a terrestrial accident. Unlike the case on islands, on the continents virtually all small vertebrates (other than commensals or parasites of the large mammals) escaped extinction. Looking toward the continents from deep-water islands promises to aid in our understanding of what happened, when it did, and what forced the change.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. The Desert Laboratory, Department of Geosciences, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona, 85701, USA

    Paul S. Martin

  2. Florida Museum of Natural History, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, 32611-7800, USA

    David W. Steadman

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  1. Paul S. Martin
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  2. David W. Steadman
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  1. Department of Mammalogy, American Museum of Natural History, 10024, New York, New York, USA

    Ross D. E. MacPhee

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Martin, P.S., Steadman, D.W. (1999). Prehistoric Extinctions on Islands and Continents. In: MacPhee, R.D.E. (eds) Extinctions in Near Time. Advances in Vertebrate Paleobiology, vol 2. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4757-5202-1_2

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