Cave hyena
| Cave hyena | ||||||||||||
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| Crocuta crocuta spelaea | ||||||||||||
| ( Goldfuss , 1823) |
The cave hyena ( Crocuta crocuta spelaea Goldfuss, 1823, formerly Hyaena spelaea ) was a subspecies of the spotted hyena that lived in Europe until the Young Pleistocene .
Way of life
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Cave hyenas weren't actually cave dwellers as the name might suggest. They only looked for the caves as shelter. Among the numerous localities of cave hyenas are among Balver cave , Bilsteinhöhle , Mammoth Cave Buchenhüll and Devil's Cave . It is not known whether they lived in packs or rather as solitary animals. In Perick cave system in Hemer were found individuals with an age up to 25 years. A mammoth bone that was found there had been broken open by humans and also shows bite marks from the cave hyena. This clearly shows that the animals sometimes robbed the remains of human prey. In the Balver cave, cave hyenas, cave bears and humans sometimes appeared in the same time periods.
In caves that were regularly visited by cave hyenas, in addition to the remains of humans and cave bears , who also often sought refuge, numerous Ice Age animals that were brought in for food. In hyenas caves in Central Europe there are about bones of woolly mammoth , woolly rhinoceros , wild horse , wild ass , steppe bison , ibex , chamois , elk , red deer , reindeer , wolf , wolverine and cave lion that were broken or bitten by the cave hyenas. Finds of young hyenas show that the caves were also used for rearing young. In addition to real caves, buildings in the open area also served as shelters in many places. Such hyena nests outside of caves are known from Bad Wildungen , for example . Similar to today in the African savannas, lions and hyenas were both food competitors and predators in Ice Age Central Europe. The large male cave lion from Siegsdorf , which was found next to a mammoth carcass, may have been the victim of a hyena clan.
Cave hyenas were often larger than today's African spotted hyenas.
Systematics
For a long time it was disputed whether the cave hyena should be considered a subspecies of the spotted hyena or as a separate species. Genetic analyzes of the mitochondrial DNA of prehistoric cave hyenas and recent spotted hyenas show that cave hyenas from the area between Europe and the Altai Mountains formed two sympatric clades and partly belong to the same clade as today's North African forms. There has probably been a genetic exchange between Africa and Eurasia at least three times since the Pliocene, and most recently a maximum of 360,000 years ago. However, this exchange of genetic material need not have prevented the development of special characteristics of the cave hyena. Due to the close relationship, the cave hyena is now mostly considered a subspecies of the spotted hyena.
Spread and extinction
Spotted hyenas were common from Western Europe to China during the Ice Age. Commonly all Pleistocene, Eurasian hyenas of the genus Crocuta are called cave hyenas. This original definition is likely to be overly simplified. To the east the cave hyena reached at least the Altai Mountains in the narrower sense. The hyenas that lived further east, for example in eastern China, appear to have belonged to a different group according to genetic evidence. The cave hyena was widespread in Europe northwards to the British Isles and central Germany. During the cold times it also occurred here together with woolly mammoths and woolly rhinos in a cold steppe. Strangely, it does not seem to have penetrated further north in the warm climates. At least there are no finds from Northern Europe. The cave hyena became extinct towards the end of the Pleistocene . The reasons for this are unclear. Climatic causes could have played a role. The cold phase during the Vistula High Glacial around 20,000 years ago may have reduced the area of distribution. The disappearance in the southern parts of Europe can hardly be explained by climatic causes. It is possible that the wild animals became less and thus the food supply deteriorated. It is also conceivable that there will be increasing competitive pressure from people who are likely to have challenged their food or shelter.
Numerous ice age hyena finds are known, for example, from the caves in the Westphalian Sauerland , such as the Balver cave , the Perick caves , the Rösenbecker cave , the Martins cave , the Grürmann cave and the cave stone . From the late Pleistocene of the Sauerland, a total of over 600 hyena bones are known, which can be assigned to at least 8 animals. Many fossil finds were also made in the caves of the Bohemian Karst in the Czech Republic. A nearly complete skeleton of a cave hyena was found in the Koněprusy Caves near Beroun .
literature
- Cajus G. Diedrich : Ice Age Hyenas. With bison bones in the cooling chamber. In: National Geographic Germany. May 9, 2005.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Cajus G. Diedrich: An Upper Pleistocene population of Crocuta crocuta spelaea (GOLDFUSS 1823) from the Ice Age spotted hyena nest Perick cave system Perick caves of Hemer (Sauerland, NW Germany) and their cannibalism. In: Phillippa. Volume 12, No. 3, 2005, pp. 93-115 ( abstract ).
- ^ Cajus G. Diedrich: Periodical use of the Balve Cave (NW Germany) as a Late Pleistocene Crocuta crocuta spelaea (Goldfuss 1823) den: Hyena occupations and bone accumulations vs. human Middle Palaeolithic activity. In: Quaternary International. Volume 233, 2011, pp. 171-184 ( online ).
- ↑ a b Cajus G. Diedrich: Steppe lion remains imported by Ice Age spotted hyenas into the Late Pleistocene Perick Caves hyena den in northern Germany. In: Quaternary Research. Volume 71, No. 3, University of Washington 2009, pp. 361-374.
- ↑ D. Nagel, N. Rohland, M. Hofreiter: Phylogeography of the cave hyaena (Crocuta crocuta spelaea) - morphology versus genetics. 18th International Senckenberg Conference 2004 in Weimar, 2004.
- ^ A b N. Rohland, JL Pollack, D. Nagel, C. Beauval, J. Airvaux, S. Pääbo, M. Hofreiter: The Population History of Extant and Extinct Hyenas. In: Molecular Biology and Evolution. Volume 22, No. 12, 2005, pp. 2435-2443, doi : 10.1093 / molbev / msi244 .
- ↑ Martin Dockner: Comparison of Crocuta crocuta crocuta Crocuta crocuta and spelaea through computer tomography. Master's thesis, University of Vienna, December 22, 2006 ( PDF file; 2.80 MB ).
- ↑ S. Varela, JM Lobo, J. Rodríguez, P. Batra: Were the Late Pleistocene climatic changes responsible for the disappearance of the European spotted hyena populations? Hindcasting a species geographic distribution across time. In: Quaternary Science Reviews. Volume 29, 2010, pp. 2027-2035.
- ^ Cajus G. Diedrich, K. Zak: Prey deposits and den sites of the Upper Pleistocene hyena Crocuta crocuta spelaea (Goldfuss, 1823) in horizontal and vertical caves of the Bohemian Karst (Czech Republic). In: Bulletin of Geosciences. Volume 81, No. 4, 2006 pp. 237-276 ( online ).