Middle and Upper Pleistocene bone accumulations in caves of the Bohemian Karst, Czech Republic, are newly classified as several types of hyena dens or hyena bone deposits, and cave bear dens. This new taphonomical and paleoecological interpretation of localities that have been known for decades is based on revision of available bone collections, additional field observations at existing localities, and on comparisons with recent spotted hyenas. The thousands of bones from this region, including about seven hundred Pleistocene hyena remains, are strongly fragmented by having been cracked and chewed, consistent with typical hyena activities. The localities can be subdi-vided chronologically as Middle and Upper Pleistocene, or taphonomically as horizontal and vertical caves and karst depressions. Horizontal and vertical caves show contrasting types of bone accumulations. Several vertical cavities were filled in the Middle Pleistocene and contain the remains of <i>Pachycrocuta brevirostris</i> and its prey. This is the case of the areas of Srbsko-Chlum and Koněprusy-Zlatý Kůň Hill. In the Upper Pleistocene, at least eight caves in the Bohemian Karst were used by hyenas of <i>Crocuta crocuta spelaea</i> as dens and prey storage, some of which were also used by cave bears for hibernating. Upper Pleistocene cave bears were scavenged postmortally by Ice Age spotted hyenas at four cave sites, where they left cracked and chewed <i>Ursus spelaeus</i> bones. Hyenas also stored the remains of their prey in the caves. These remains also include rests of other hyenas, which indicates can-nibalism. Fecal pellets were used for marking the den sites. The Nad Kačákem Cave near Hostim is shown to have been a frequented hyena den based on the presence of many 'nibbling sticks' and the remains of juvenile hyena bones. Many hyena skeletons of C. c. spelaea, including juveniles and adults, their coprolites, and the partly cracked bones of their stored prey, were found in vertical caves such as Srbsko-Chlum-Komín. The most spectacu-lar finds are a nearly complete skeleton of the female steppe lion Panthera leo spelaea and an embryo of the Przewalski horse Equus ferus przewalskii. A nearly complete hyena skeleton in the Koněprusy Caves-Prošek Dome is another remarkable find. The most bone-rich localities at Koněprusy-Zlatý Kůň Hill and Srbsko-Chlum Hill are located on, or close to, exposed hill tops, where hyenas had an overview of the surrounding landscape. Statistical analysis of the remains shows that the main animals preyed upon by Upper Pleistocene hyenas were <i>Equus ferus przewalskii</i> and <i>Coelodonta antiquitatis</i>. Additionally, the hyenas fed on <i>Bison priscus</i>, <i>Rangifer tarandus</i>, <i>Cervus elaphus</i>, <i>Megaloceros giganteus</i>, <i>Equus hydruntinus</i>, the Bohemian alpine fauna including <i>Rupricapra rupricapra</i> and <i>Capra ibex</i>, and even the carnivores ...

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Late Pleistocene spotted hyenaCrocuta crocuta spelaea(Goldfuss, 1823) and steppe lionPanthera leo spelaea(Goldfuss, 1810) were top predators in Central Europe. The fossil record (2.303 hyena/1.373 lion bones = ratio 3/1) from 106 cave and open air sites demonstrates comparable associations to modern African hyenas/lions resulting in competition about prey and territory. Cannibalism within extinct spotted hyenas is well documented, including two individual skeletons. Those hyenas produced bone accumulations at dens. Feeding specializations on different megamammal groups are demonstrated for Late Pleistocene hyenas whose prey partly overlaps (e.g., cave bears) with those of lions and wolves. At most fossil sites, 1–3% of the lion remains indicate scavenging of lions by hyenas. The larger Late Pleistocene felids focussed on cervids (reindeers specialization during the high glacial = LGM), on bovids (steppe bison/aurochs), and possibly on saiga antelope and on the cave bear, hunting deep in caves during their hibernations and targeting cubs. The cave bear feeding was the target of all three top predators (lions, hyenas, and wolves) in the Late Pleistocene boreal forests which caused deathly conflicts in caves between them, especially with lions/hyenas and herbivorous cave bears that have no modern analogue.

Dinosaur tracks occur at three vertebrate tracksites in north-western Germany, in the acanthicum/mutabilis ammonoid biozone of the basal Upper Kimmeridgian (Upper Jurassic,. The trackbeds are mud-cracked, siliciclastic, tidal sand flat biolaminates, overlain by paleosol beds. Channels contain rare fossils of sauropod, ornithopod and pterosaur bones as well as shark and plant remains. Large sauropod tracks of the Elephantopoides type, which have been found in an intertidal megatracksite environment to the north of the Rhenish Massif, are reviewed herein, together with a camptosaurid track type (?Iguanodontipus), the theropod track Megalosauropus and possible dryosaurid Grallator tracks. These large dinosaur tracks have been reviewed and compared to all other known European localities. At the Barkhausen tracksite with its important ichnoholotypes, trackways of a possible sauropod herd consisting of ten small to mediumsized individuals and one large individual have been exposed, revealing different speeds of travel as well as important social behaviour in these large herbivorous dinosaurs. Two theropods also left their imprints on the same track horizon, one travelling towards the south in a direction contrary to the movement of the herd, and the second travelling towards the north-west, cutting across the other trackways. Five different types of Upper Jurassic dinosaur tracks have now been recorded from coastal environments scattered around Europe, with the best footprint records forming extensive megatracksites in biolaminates between Jurassic islands in central Europe. These intertidal flats formed periodic bridges between the islands, allowing dinosaur interchanges and migrations between America and Eurasia, which may help to explain the much broader palaeobiogeographic distributions of dinosaur species during the Late Jurassic.

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