Illustration of PNG megafauna Hulitherium, Thylacine, Protemnodon, Tree Kangaroo, Bulmer’s Flying Fox and Bruijn’s Long-beaked Echidna (delegated right) types: Hulitherium thomasetti, Thlacinus sp. cf. T. cynocephalus, Protemnodon nombe, Protemnodon tumbuna, Dendrolagus noibano, Aproteles bumerae (extant), Zaglossus bruijni (extant) in New Guinea, Upper Montane forest. Credit: Peter Schouten (End of the Megafauna) The reign of Papua New Guinea’s megafauna continued long after human beings arrived.A brand-new research study recommends that a huge kangaroo that previously passed through the Papua New Guinea Highlands on 4 legs might have lived as just recently as 20,000 years back, long after large-bodied megafauna on mainland Australia ended up being extinct. In an effort to find out more about the remarkable nature of PNG, paleontologists from Flinders University and archaeologists and geoscientists from Australian National University (ANU) have actually reconsidered megafauna bones from the abundant Nombe Rock Shelter fossil website in Chimbu Province. New dating techniques from the research study expose that when people very first gotten here in the PNG Highlands, approximately 60,000 years back, various huge mammal types, consisting of the extinct thylacine and a marsupial that looked like a panda (called Hulitherium tomasettii), were still present. Excavations at the Nombe rock shelter taken in 1979 throughout early fieldwork led by the Australian National University. Credit: Barry Shaw (ANU)/ Archaeology in Oceania journal. Remarkably, 2 big extinct kangaroo types, among which bounded on 4 legs instead of 2, might have made it through in the area for an extra 40,000 years. “If these megafaunal types did undoubtedly endure in the PNG Highlands for a lot longer than their Australian equivalents, then it might have been due to the fact that individuals just went to the Nombe location occasionally and in low numbers up until after 20,000 years earlier,” states ANU Professor of Archaeological Science Tim Denham, co-lead author in the brand-new research study released in the journal Archaeology in Oceania. “Nombe rock shelter is the only website in New Guinea understood to have actually been inhabited by individuals for 10s of countless years and maintains remains of extinct megafaunal types, the majority of them special to New Guinea. “New Guinea is a forested, mountainous, northern part of the previously more comprehensive Australian continent called ‘Sahul’ however our understanding of its faunal and human history is bad compared to that of mainland Australia,” states Professor Denham who at first carried out fieldwork in the PNG Highlands in1990 Research study co-author Professor Gavin Prideaux, from the Flinders University Palaeontology Laboratory, states the current Nombe research study follows comparable proof from Kangaroo Island, formerly produced by Flinders paleontologists, that likewise recommends megafaunal kangaroos might have continued to around 20,000 years back in a few of the less available locations of the continent. He states lots of basic presumptions about megafaunal termination timelines have actually been “more hazardous than handy.” “Although it is typically presumed that all of the megafaunal types in Australia and New Guinea ended up being extinct coast to coast by 40,000 years back, this generalization is not based upon quite real proof,” states Professor Prideaux. “It is most likely more damaging than handy in solving precisely what occurred to the lots of big mammals, birds, and reptiles that were residing on the continent when individuals initially got here.” The Nombe rock shelter, situated in the area of the Nongefaro, Pila, and Nola neighborhoods in PNG, would have been occasionally gone to by nomadic groups of Highlands individuals in ancient times. The covert rock shelter was very first excavated by archaeologists in the 1960 s, however the most extensive stage of fieldwork was performed in 1971 and 1980 by ANU archaeologist Dr. Mary-Jane Mountain, who is likewise an author on the most recent paper. Her preliminary research study yielded the very first in-depth description and analysis of the Nombe website and played an essential function in forming our understanding of the human history of the PNG Highlands. “Mary-Jane (Mountain) at first assumed that megafauna at the website might have endured for 10s of centuries after human colonization, however this has actually just been verified with the arrival of brand-new methods in archaeology, dating, and palaeontological science,” Professor Denham states. Teacher Prideaux states these brand-new applications of modern-day analytical strategies, or brand-new excavations at the Nombe website, would even more validate timelines of late enduring megafauna and period of profession by individuals in PNG. Referral: “Re-evaluating the proof for late-surviving megafauna at Nombe rockshelter in the New Guinea highlands” by Gavin J. Prideaux, Isaac A. R. Kerr, Jacob D. van Zoelen, Rainer Grün, Sander van der Kaars, Annette Oertle, Katerina Douka, Elle Grono, Aleese Barron, Mary-Jane Mountain, Michael C. Westaway and Tim Denham, 16 September 2022, Archaeology in Oceania. DOI: 10.1002/ arco.5274 The research study was moneyed by the Australian Research Council.
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