TY - JOUR
T1 - Age constraints on Pleistocene megafauna at Tight Entrance Cave in southwestern Australia
AU - Ayliffe, Linda
AU - Prideaux, Gavin
AU - Bird, Michael
AU - Grun, Rainer
AU - Roberts, Richard
AU - Gully, Grant
AU - Jones, Rhys
AU - Fifield, Keith
AU - Cresswell, Richard
PY - 2008
Y1 - 2008
N2 - A well-stratified succession of fossiliferous sediments occurs in Tight Entrance Cave, southwestern Australia. These infill deposits contain the remains of megafauna and have accumulated intermittently since the Middle Pleistocene: >137, 137-119 and 50-29 ka, according to the results of 14C, U-Th, ESR and OSL dating techniques. Megafaunal species richness was highest in the latest part of the penultimate glacial maximum and during the subsequent last interglacial (137-119 ka), but remains are less abundant following an apparent ?70 ka depositional hiatus in the sequence. Most megafaunal specimens from the upper (<44 ka) units are fragmentary, and reworking from older strata cannot yet be ruled out. However, one specimen of Simosthenurus occidentalis (a large extinct kangaroo), a pair of articulated dentaries showing no signs of secondary transportation, was found within a sedimentary layer deposited between 48 and 50 ka. This represents one of the youngest demonstrably in situ occurrences of an Australian megafaunal taxon. Crown Copyright
AB - A well-stratified succession of fossiliferous sediments occurs in Tight Entrance Cave, southwestern Australia. These infill deposits contain the remains of megafauna and have accumulated intermittently since the Middle Pleistocene: >137, 137-119 and 50-29 ka, according to the results of 14C, U-Th, ESR and OSL dating techniques. Megafaunal species richness was highest in the latest part of the penultimate glacial maximum and during the subsequent last interglacial (137-119 ka), but remains are less abundant following an apparent ?70 ka depositional hiatus in the sequence. Most megafaunal specimens from the upper (<44 ka) units are fragmentary, and reworking from older strata cannot yet be ruled out. However, one specimen of Simosthenurus occidentalis (a large extinct kangaroo), a pair of articulated dentaries showing no signs of secondary transportation, was found within a sedimentary layer deposited between 48 and 50 ka. This represents one of the youngest demonstrably in situ occurrences of an Australian megafaunal taxon. Crown Copyright
U2 - 10.1016/j.quascirev.2008.07.008
DO - 10.1016/j.quascirev.2008.07.008
M3 - Article
VL - 27
SP - 1784
EP - 1788
JO - Quaternary Science Reviews
JF - Quaternary Science Reviews
SN - 0277-3791
ER -