Taphonomic information from the modern vertebrate death assemblage of Doñana National Park, Spain

Abstract

Modern death assemblages provide insights about the early stages of fossilization and useful ecological information about the species inhabiting the ecosystem. We present the results of taphonomic monitoring of modern vertebrate carcasses and bones from Doñana National Park, a Mediterranean coastal ecosystem in Andalusia, Spain. Ten different habitats were surveyed. Half of them occur in active depositional environments (marshland, lake margin, river margin, beach and dunes). Most of the skeletal remains belong to land mammals larger than 5 kg in body weight (mainly wild and feral ungulates). Overall, the Doñana bone assemblage shows good preservation with little damage to the bones, partly as a consequence of the low predator pressure on large vertebrates. Assemblages from active depositional habitats differ significantly from other habitats in terms of the higher incidence of breakage and chewing marks on bones in the latter, which result from scavenging, mainly by wild boar and red fox. The lake-margin and river-margin death assemblages have high concentrations of well preserved bones that are undergoing burial and offer the greatest potential to produce fossil assemblages. The spatial distribution of species in the Doñana death assemblage generally reflects the preferred habitats of the species in life. Meadows seem to be a preferred winter habitat for male deer, given the high number of shed antlers recorded there. This study is further proof that taphonomy can provide powerful insights to better understand the ecology of modern species and to infer past and future scenarios for the fossil record.

Observaciones tafonómicas naturalistas en el Sistema Lagunar Hinojo-Las Tunas (Campo de Dunas del Centro Pampeano, Argentina)

“…Es necesario considerar que los conjuntos faunísticos representados en los sitios arqueológicos pueden estar conformados por una mezcla de huesos aportados por distintos agentes a lo largo de miles de años y a su vez, haber estados sometidos a procesos de destrucción diferencial (Beherensmeyer y Dechant Boaz, 1980;Binford, 1981;Borrero, 2001;Lyman, 2003;Miller et al, 2014;Gutiérrez et al, 2018). Los estudios tafonómicos que abordan la distribución natural de huesos en los ecosistemas actuales permiten identificar los múltiples procesos que afectan a los restos orgánicos y controlan su destrucción, acumulación y preservación (Kidwell y Flessa, 1995;Belardi y Carballo Marina, 2003;Behrensmeyer y Miller, 2012;Marchionni et al, 2020;Domingo et al, 2020), así como evaluar el impacto de la lluvia natural de huesos sobre el registro arqueológico (Borrero, 1989(Borrero, , 2001(Borrero, , 2014. Asimismo, este enfoque naturalista es una fuente de información útil para analizar las extinciones locales y reemplazos de especies, variaciones en las abundancias taxonómicas y amenazas actuales, lo que es relevante para contribuir a la biología de la conservación y el manejo de la vida silvestre (Kidwell y Flessa, 1995;Miller, 2011;Prassack, 2011;Massigoge et al, 2015).…”