Or , to put that reasonably more accurately , did not being able to down adorable little bunnies in turn belt down the Neanderthals ? When all that stood between experimental extinction and survival was figuring out how to run rabbits , it seems Neanderthals prefer extinction .
There are lots of hypotheses as to why the Neanderthals kick the bucket extinct , most focusing on some combination of environmental change and encroachment by our human ancestors . But , on a introductory stage , Neanderthals should have been capable to survive for as long as there was food uncommitted for them to use up . A stack of old thinking has suggested that Neanderthals were n’t capable to hunt some of the more complicated prey that their human counterparts feasted on , but late research at Neanderthal sites have give away that they were patently perfectly capable of hunting Pisces the Fishes , snort , and marine mammals .
The one species that might have outwitted them — or at least leaven too difficult to hound — was the rabbit . As New Scientist reports , John Fa and his inquiry team at the UK ’s Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust examined cave site belonging to both man and Neanderthals in France and Spain . estimate by animate being stiff found in the cave , both grouping appeared to subsist on large fauna like deer until about 30,000 geezerhood ago , at which detail world switch over to eating smaller prey like rabbits .
There ’s no grounds that Neanderthals made a like move , and that coincides with when their population went into irrevocable decline . It could be a sudden scarceness of enceinte target mean Europe”s hominins had to adapt cursorily and eat small quarry , with hare serving as a new backbone of the human diet ( although , it should be pointed out that humans were n’t eating only cony , as that ’s a very , very forged idea ) . Fa and his team theorise that large - scale rabbit - hunting required the use of fire or dogs to trail rabbits out of their warrens , which might have proved too complex a strategy for Neanderthals to superior .
For more , check outNew Scientistandthe original paperat the Journal of Human Evolution .
look-alike by Moyan Brenn onFlickr .
EvolutionHuman evolutionneanderthalsPaleontologyRabbitsScience
Daily Newsletter
Get the best technical school , science , and civilisation newsworthiness in your inbox daily .
word from the future , rescue to your present tense .
You May Also Like
