Hulitherium
| Hulitherium | ||||||||||||
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| Temporal occurrence | ||||||||||||
| Pleistocene | ||||||||||||
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| Systematics | ||||||||||||
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Hulitherium | ||||||||||||
| Flannery & Plane , 1986 | ||||||||||||
Hulitherium is a genus of marsupials from the late Pleistocene.
features
Hulitherium , the "beast of the Huli people", was one of the largest animals in New Guinea with a live weight of 75 to 200 kg. An almost complete skull, typically zygomaturin, is u. A. known from Hulitherium . Its limbs were more mobile than other diprotodontids. His way of life was herbivorous. In the mountain rainforests of New Guinea, the Hulitherium likely fed on bamboo . Thus his way of life was convergent to that of the recent giant panda . Since the hulitherium's habitat has not changed, humans were probably to blame for its extinction.
species
Only one species is known. Hulitherium tomasettii FLANNERY, PLANE, 1986 lived in the late Pleistocene and belongs to the Pureni local fauna of New Guinea. The closest relative of Hulitherium was likely the New Guinea zygomaturine Maokopia .
literature
- Long, Archer, Flannery, Hand: Prehistoric Mammals of Australia and New Guinea, one hundred million years of evolution . Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore / London 2002, ISBN 0-8018-7223-5