Methods for inferring paleohabitats from discrete traits of the bovid postcranial skeleton
- 作者：DeGusta ; David ; Vrba ; Elisabeth
- 关键词：Bovidae ; Ecological morphology ; Locomotor behavior ; Non-metric traits ; Paleoecology ; Paleoenvironment
- 刊名：Journal of Archaeological Science
- 出版年：2005
- 期刊代码：137_03054403
- 类别：soc
- 出版时间：July, 2005
- 卷：32
- 期：7
- 页码：1115-1123
- 文件大小：154 K
摘要
Various “ecomorphological” methods exist for using the functional morphology of bovid postcranial remains to reconstruct paleohabitats. Most such methods use measurements, but both Gentry [The Bovidae (Mammalia) of the Fort Ternan fossil fauna, in: L.S.B. Leakey, R.J.G. Savage (Eds.), Fossil Vertebrates of Africa, vol. 2, Academic Press, London, 1970, pp. 243–323] and Köhler [Skeleton and Habitat of Recent and Fossil Ruminants, Münchner Geowissenschaftliche Abdhandlungen 25 (1993) 1–88] have identified numerous discrete (non-metric) traits of the bovid postcranial skeleton that are said to be indicative of habitat preference. However, these traits have not been systematically tested on a modern bovid sample. We report here such a test. Eighty-six non-metric characters were evaluated using a sample of modern African bovids (n = 197). Of the 86 characters, 48 were either insufficiently defined or exhibited too much intra-individual variation to be potentially indicative of habitat. Two characters were invariant in the sample. Of the remaining 36 characters, 11 were sufficiently correlated with habitat preference (Cramer's V > 0.5) to be of some potential use in reconstructing paleohabitats. These characters are primarily concentrated on the phalanges, and provide a means by which fragmentary phalanges can be used for habitat reconstruction, albeit at a broad level of resolution (open or closed habitat). The estimated accuracy of these methods is greater than 80%. Their use on fragmentary remains may lessen the bias introduced by basing habitat reconstructions on more complete fossils.