The making of today: cultural biogeography

Use of Tools and FireDomesticationTransplantationBiocidesConservation

Human impacts on the world’s fauna and flora

MEANS ENDS (e.g.) TIME (yrs)

Tools Hunting ~500,000 Fire Ecosystem change ~50,000Domestication Inc. food supply ~10,000Transplantation Biotic homogenization ~500Biocides Pest control ~50Conservation Species maintenance ~50

Hunting: tools and effects

Wooden (spruce)spears found in association with butchered horses (plus elephant and rhinoceros bones) in middle Pleistocene deposits (~ 400,000 BP) at Schöningnen, north Germany.

Late Pleistocene extinctions of megamammals

Major periods of extinctions of large mammals in late

Quaternary0 10 20 30 40 50 ka BP

Australia

S. America

N. America

Europe

Africa

Tem

per a

ture

ch

an

ge (

°C)

0

-5

-10

Was climate change to blame?

0 10 20 30 40 50 ka BP

Australia

S. America

N. America

Europe

Africa

The demise of the Australian

megafauna

Graphic: http://acl.arts.usyd.edu.au/research/cuddie/animalssm.gi

fAccording to Roberts et al., (2001), the continent - wide extinction of the Australian megafauna occurred about 46 000 years ago, within 10±5 ka of human arrival.Roberts, R.G. et al. 2001. Science 292, 1888-1892.

e.g. Diprotodon a 2m tall,3 ton wombat

Were humans to blame?

Extinction may have been a product of:butchering by huntersecosystem disruption (by fire?)by Aboriginal colonistsclimatic change

Roberts et al. (2001) found that:12 of the 20 genera of megafauna

survived until at least 80 000 years ago; and

extinction occurred ± simultaneously across

the continent at about 46 ka BP.

Are we also to blame in the Americas?

- the Pleistocene “blitzkrieg”

hypothesis. (15 genera go extinct in North

America from 11.5 -10 ka BP)

(note ‘killing front’)

Post-colonial extinctions (North America)

Tool: fluted point

Some of the victims

Tim

es

of

exti

nct

ion:

the init

ial phase

Post-colonial extinction: New Zealand moas*

(*11 species of ratites; all now extinct)

Archaeological evidence Population model (simulation)

QuickTime™ and aTIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor

are needed to see this picture.

Holdaway, R.N. and Jacomb, C. 2000. Science 287, 2250-2254.

Post-colonial extinction model:eastern Polynesia

QuickTime™ and aTIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor

are needed to see this picture.

Steadman, D.W. and Martin, P.S. 2003. Jour. Archaeol. Sci., 61, 133-147.

Post-colonial extinction: Dodo (Raphus cucullatus)

• A giant flightless pigeon restricted to the the island of Mauritius.

• First sighted ~AD1600, the dodo was extinct by ~AD1693.

• Sailors butchered them for food, and feral animals (rats, cats and pigs) destroyed their nests.

Graphic courtesy of the American Museum of Natural History

Post-colonial (near) extinction of the buffalo

Post-colonial extinction:the passenger pigeon

1800 1903

109

106

103

100

Popu

lati

on

?

Post-colonial extinction: the

Rocky Mountain locust

1875: a swarm of ~3 trillion insects (the swarm covered ~300000sq. km, 0.5 km deep) passed over central Great Plains.

1876: US Congress declared the locust to be “the single greatest impediment to the settlement of the country”.

1902: last pair observed in Manitoba.

Ploughing of floodplain areas in western plainslikely destroyed their breeding habitat

Lockwood, J. 2004. “Locust” Basic Books

Extinctions since AD 1600

Mammals BirdsAsia 4 5Africa 11 2S. America 1 -N. America 10 7Europe 6 1Antarctica* 1 68W. Indies 3 22Hawaii - 24* incl. islands

Use of tools (axes and fire):

deforestation

Jerf-el-Ahmar archaeological site

N. Syria;~11,600 years old

Pollen record,Ghab valley

ka,BP

5

8

10

15

Effects of deforestatio

n

On the landscape of Attica (central Greece), Plato commented:“what now remains compared with what then existed is like the skeleton of a sick man, all the fat and soft earth having wasted away, and only the bare framework of the land being left”In the Mediterranean Basin deforestation as a result of agricultural clearance and pasture led to permanent changes in the character of the ecosystem.

Maori use of fire

for forest clearance

1. Charcoal in soil 2. Bracken (rhizomes gathered)

3. Moa habitat modification?

Maori colonization~1000 BP

Fire as a tool of ecosystem “maintenance”

“the Indians of the interior have another intolerable method, . . . which is to fire the plains and forests . . . both to drive the mosquitoes away and at the same time drive lizards and like things from the earth to eat. They also kill deer by encircling fires; deprived of pasturage, the animals are forced to seek it where the Indians may trap them”.

Cabeza de Vaca, A.N. Relación (1542)

Cabeza de Vaca was shipwrecked by a hurricane on the coast of Texas in 1528 after trying to sail a raft back to Havana with the few survivors of an ill-fated Spanish expedition to search for gold in Florida. He reached the Spanish settlements on the west coast of Mexico 8 years later.

Domestication: from foraging to farming

Roots and tubers:Forager: dig up.Transition: dig up-replant part.Early farmer: clear land, plant roots, weed,

harvest, save some roots,etc.

Grains:Forager: pluck seedheadsTransition: cut seedheads-save some*-replant.Early farmer: clear land, plant seeds, weed,

harvest, save some seed,etc.* easiest seeds to save were non-shattering (e.g. changeover from einkorn to wheat)

“Did roots precede grains?”David Harris

Plant cultigensPurpose Examples

• Food• Food additives• Fibre• Wood • Beverages• Narcotics,

stimulants• Ornamentals

rice, cabbage pepper, sugar hemp, jute radiata pine tea, coffee tobacco, grape tulip, rose

The geography of domestication

De Candolle, a Swiss botanist, investigated areas of domestication in the 19th C. The Russian botanist N.I. Vavilov undertook extensive field collections to identify “hearths” of domestication from the 1920’s until his death in 1943. Vavilov contended that diversity hotspots in domesticated species (e.g. ~50 varieties of Zea mays grown in southern Mexico-Guatemala at present) were indicative of hearths.Jack Harlan (American geneticist), however, noted that plant species are particularly prone to radiate into diverse varieties in mountain areas - these may not be the original hearths.

Nikolai Vavilov

Plant domestication hearths

after Vavilov

Crop hearths1. China rice, soybean, rhubarb, apricots, citrus,

tea?2. India / SE Asia eggplant, mango, jute, rice, banana,

sugarcane3. Pak-Afghanistan cotton, soybeans?4. Middle East wheat, onion, turnip, apple, fig, melon,

alfalfa, pea, lentil5. Mediterranean date, olive, lettuce, sugar beet6. Ethiopia coffee, okra7. Mesoamerica maize, sweet potato, avocado, cotton,

capsicum8. Andes / Brazil potato, pumpkin, tomato, runner bean /

peanut, pineapple, tobacco

African hearths

Early wheat varieties

Einkorn Emmer Spelt Kamut

Biogeographic range of wild cereals

Emmer

Einkorn

Barley

Domestication of wheat

wild emmer

bread wheat

Times of initial

doemstication

Animal cultigensPurpose Examples

• Food• Labour• Hunting • Animal products• Ornamentals

cattle horse, yak dog* silk, wool,

honey budgies,

goldfish

*or did the dog domesticate us?

Animal hearthsChina pig, duck, (carp?)India / SE Asia pig, dog, zebu cattle, chicken,

elephant,water buffalo

Iran-Afghanistan bibos cattle, sheep, goatCentral Asia horse, bactrian camel, yakMiddle East cat, dromedaryEurope auroch cattle, rabbit, goose, reindeerAfrica ass, guinea fowlNorth America turkeyMesoamerica dog, turkeyAndes llama, alpaca, guinea pig

Artificial selection for variable traits in

domesticated species

e.g. cabbages dogs

Would Neolithic folk recognize a cauliflower or poodle?

Selection for gigantism of desirable traits

Above: 2 yr-old coho “Frankenfish”Below: 2 yr-old wild coho

The Province (2001/02/16)

“French grow giant snails even

bigger” Globe & Mail (1999/02/04)

Zea mays from Mexican

archaeological sites

7500 BP 500 BP

10

cm

Domestication and agricultural technology

e.g. the ‘tribulum’ - a threshing sled (flints inserted in wooden planks) designed to separate the grain from the chaff and straw, and break up the straw for animal feed. Still used in some areas of the Middle East.

Agricultural transference in the Neolithic: crops, technology and language diffuse from

hearth

barnbarley bar far (farina)[Lat. = emmer][Eng.]

Agricultural transference in recent times

e.g. the grape (Vitis vinifera)

Agricultural transference:the “Columbian Exchange”

From the NewWorld to the Old:

PotatoesCorn

TomatoesSquashesPeppersTobaccoRubber

Pineapples(+ diseases?)

~AD1500

From the OldWorld to the New:

Wheat(many vegetables)

Grapes BananasHorsesCattle

(+ weeds and diseases)

Agricultural transference: tropical plantation crops

rubber

cacao

coffee

tobacco

pineapples

Why? protection from co-evolved pests and pathogens;consider effects: slavery and indentured labour

bananassugarcane

Silvicultural transference: introduction of exotic trees into

Britain (AD 1600-1950)

Biological introductions: invasive species

Deliberate introductions:e.g. rabbits in Australia;

prickly pear in Australia and Mediterranean;

starlings, pigeons and house sparrows in North America; bullfrogs in B.C. Inadvertent introductions:e.g. brown rat (almost everywhere);

knapweeds and cheatgrass in western North America; ballast stowaways (worldwide)

Deliberate introductions:prickly pear (Opuntia stricta),

Australia

• Introduced into Australia in 1788 to form the basis of a cochineal dye industry. Opuntia was late planted for emergency cattle fodder and as hedging by farmers in NSW;

• Invaded huge areas of pastureland in NSW and QLD from 1900-1930;

• Largely (but not completely) controlled by introduction of Cactoblastis cactorum (a moth from Argentina that feeds exclusively on Opuntia) in 1926

Graphics: http://www.northwestweeds.nsw.gov.au

Deliberate introductions: American bullfrog (Rana catesbeiana), BC

• Introduced into BC in the 1930’s by frog farmers;• Spreading rapidly in SW BC (>1 km/yr on

southern Vancouver Island), often by deliberate introdcutions into backyard ponds;

• Feeds on native frogs, garter snakes, etc.

QuickTime™ and aTIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor

are needed to see this picture.

Inadvertent introductionsMany recent introductions of aquatic aliens have resulted from release of ballast water.

Zebra mussel (Dreissina polymorpha): released from ballast waters into the Great Lakes in 1986.

Invasive species: mitigation

B.C. woman fined for importing crabs in suitcaseWednesday, August 13, 2008“A Richmond, B.C., woman has been fined $10,000 after pleading guilty to importing 70 live Shanghai hairy crabs - a delicacy in Asia and one of the world's most invasive species……It's prohibited in Canada because of its ravenous appetite that can outcompete native species, harming the ecosystem and the fishing industry.It also burrows into riverbanks and dikes, causing instability and erosion.The Shanghai hairy crab, named for its furry claws, is also a carrier of the Oriental lung fluke, a parasite that can cause tuberculosis and even death in humans if improperly cooked…..The crab has been found in Quebec, Ontario's Great Lakes area, the U.S. eastern seaboard, California and the Columbia River estuary in Washington state, according to the U.S. Geological Survey”

Canwest News Service