Macaques at the margins: the biogeography and extinction of Macaca sylvanus in Europe

Abstract

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First record of macaques from the Early Pleistocene of Incarcal (NE Iberian Peninsula)

“…Despite the wide geographical and temporal distribution of macaques during the European Plio-Pleistocene, their fossil record is quite sparse, thereby suggesting that they were not very abundant, probably due to suboptimal ecological conditions (Meloro and Elton, 2012;Elton and O'Regan, 2014). Here we report the first primate find from the Early Pleistocene site complex of Incarcal (NE Iberian Peninsula): an upper molar identified as a macaque that was found during the 2015 field season.…”

“…The remaining fossil macaque remains from Europe, following Szalay and Delson (1979) and Delson (1980), are customarily attributed to various extinct subspecies of M. sylvanus (e.g., Alba et al, 2008Alba et al, , 2011Marig o et al, 2014). Due to the lack of complete cranial remains, these extinct subspecies are not particularly well characterized, being largely delimited on biochronological grounds (Delson, 1980;Alba et al, 2008Alba et al, , 2011Marig o et al, 2014) (Meloro and Elton, 2012;Elton and O'Regan, 2014).…”

“…Although fossil macaques are relatively well recorded in the Iberian Peninsula (Marig o et al, 2014) and elsewhere in Europe (Elton and O'Regan, 2014), their presence in Early Pleistocene Iberian sites is quite limited. For example, this subspecies had been previously reported from the roughly coeval Iberian site of Quibas (ca.…”

“…This agrees with the presence of macaques, since extant M. sylvanus habitats are characterized by a Mediterranean climate with warm summers (Fooden, 2007), and cold temperatures represent a serious threat to their survival (by restricting access to trophic resources; McFarland and Majolo, 2013). Paleontological data further suggest that the past distribution of M. sylvanus in Europe was largely determined by climatic factors, as the species expanded northward during the interglacials and retreated into Mediterranean areas during the glacials (Fooden, 2007;Elton and O'Regan, 2014). Evergreen forests with a nearby water supply appear to be the optimal biotope of extant M. sylvanus, since these monkeys need to be near water and, in spite of being largely terrestrial, still require trees for sleeping, feeding and avoiding predators (Fooden, 2007;Masseti and Bruner, 2009).…”

“…Although open biotopes are not optimal for extant M. sylvanus, they are not at odds with the presence of this taxon at Incarcal, since this species currently inhabits a wide variety of biotopes, including not only forests of conifers (cedar and fir) and oaks (both deciduous and evergreen), but also more open areas dominated by herbaceous vegetation (such as scrub, grasslands and rocky ridges; Fooden, 2007). In fact, the diet of extant M. sylvanus (and probably that of fossil European macaques as well; Elton and O'Regan, 2014), besides being more folivorous than that of tropical macaques (allowing them to cope with seasonal variation in fruit availability), is regularly complemented with herbaceous vegetation (Hanya et al, 2011). The Barbary macaque further shows a preference for seeds (when available) over leaves (Hanya et al, 2011).…”