A changing climate, humans and fire were a deadly combination for the big animals that used to roam southern California. Listen to The Conversation Weekly podcast.
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Articles on Paleoecology
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As the climate warms, devastating fires are increasingly likely. The 2020 fires pushed the Southern Rockies beyond the historical average. Is there hope for the Northern Rockies?
Contrary to the idea that apes evolved their upright posture to reach for fruit in the forest canopy, the earliest known ape with this stature, Morotopithecus, lived in more open grassy environments.
Megalodon, the world’s largest known shark species, swam the oceans long before humans existed. Its teeth are all that’s left, and they tell a story of an apex predator that vanished.
Scientists studied charcoal layers in the sediment of lake beds across the Rockies to track fires over time. They found increasing fire activity as the climate warmed.
We found evidence of irreversible ecological breakdown millions of years ago – this time round, we should heed the warning signs.
A new environmental record for a prehistoric site in Kenya helped researchers figure out how external conditions influenced which of our ancient ancestors lived there, with what way of life.
Evidence shows Native Americans in New England lived lightly on the land for thousands of years. It wasn’t until Europeans arrived that the landscape experienced major human impacts.
Top contributors
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Postdoctoral Associate in Ecology, University of Colorado Boulder
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Professor of Fire Ecology, University of Montana
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Dean of the Harpur College of Arts and Sciences and Professor of Anthropology, Binghamton University, State University of New York
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Director of the Human Origins Program, Smithsonian Institution
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Senior postdoctoral fellow in palaeoecology, Stockholm University
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Professor of Paleoclimatology and Paleoecology, University of Wyoming
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Assistant Professor of Paleoecology, University of California, Merced
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Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Geosciences, University of Cambridge
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Specialist in Geoscience, Goethe University Frankfurt am Main
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Professor of Anthropology, University of Michigan
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Professor of Anthropology, University of Minnesota
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Associate Professor of Geosciences, Baylor University
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Associate Curator, La Brea Tar Pits; Adjunct Faculty, Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, University of California, Los Angeles
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Professor of Environmental Science, Emerson College
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Editor and Co-Host, The Conversation Weekly Podcast, The Conversation
