Fossil of huge penguin that lived 3 million years ago discovered in New Zealand — what happened to it?
Three million years ago, an extinguished parent of the great penguins today – emperors And kiss – lived in Aotearoa New Zealand.
We know it because our new study Describes a spectacular fossilized skull of a large penguin found on the Côte de Taranaki.
Compared to the emperors penguins, however, Taranaki’s great penguin had a much stronger and longer beak. It probably more like a king’s penguin (Aptenodytes patagonicus), only much larger.
At the time, the world was warmer than today. But when the climate has cooled, this penguin disappeared.
We argue that the cold was not to blame because hoopoe And little The penguins in New Zealand resisted the same change and remained. Large penguins have moved south and today live in frozen waste of Antarctic. So what led their old in relation to extinction?
The sediments which now form cliffs on the beach side in the south of Taranaki were deposited at a time when global temperatures were about 3 ° C above those of the pre-industrial era. The fossils of this period transform our understanding of how biodiversity could react to the increase in temperatures.
For example, Aotearoa housed Fish crate And monk jointsBoth are still (sub) tropical species today. In a strange contradiction, they coexisted with large penguins – now found in much colder climates – in old New Zealand.
The most northern reproductive colonies of King Penguins are today around 46.1 ° s of latitude in the Subantarctic Crozet Islands, where sea water temperatures reach 3 to 10 ° C. From there, it is only cooling towards the higher latitudes where the penguins of emperors live.
Three million years ago, the great penguins of Aotearoa extended to the north of 40.5 ° s, where the south of Taranaki was then located. They fed in waters of 20 ° C, much warmer than their share of their loved ones today.
This gentle existence ended with the Ice Pleistocene About 2.58 million years ago. The extent of the ice and the sea level moved backwards and forward when the temperatures fluctuated and end up caving down. But why would such cooling eradicate giant penguins, who thrive in polar conditions today, of New Zealand?
Giant air predators
The fossil evidence of giant penguins in Aotearoa are limited and the exact reasons for their disappearance remain unclear. Despite this, their pure presence suggests that they were less limited by the temperatures of the sea surface than we thought before. Another mechanism must be at stake.
Until about 500 years ago, Aotearoa was the hunting ground for Giant haast eagle And the huge Forbes Harrier. They were great raptors. They understood large birds like MOA in their diet. Their ancestors Arrived from Australia In the last three million years.
Based on what we see with the great living penguins, the great penguin of Taranaki has almost certainly formed large colonies exposed along the coast. It could have been easy targets for a giant eagle or a harness hunting air.
On the other hand, small penguins still found in Aotearoa today have more cryptic reproduction behavior. They nest in burrows, natural crevices and dense vegetation, and tend to cross the beaches at night, which may have helped them to avoid air predators.
Predation on earth is only a hypothesis, however, to help explain why these penguins have turned out in the region while others have survived. Other possibilities include changes in the marine environment.
We know that the availability of reduced food can be devastating for penguinsBut it is difficult to see why it would distinguish big penguins.
Above all, our study provides new information on the tolerances of the habitat of large penguins. Today, royal penguins and emperors can withstand temperatures up to 20 ° C higher than those in which they usually feed.
Three million years ago, their parent experienced such warmth. While the world continues to warm up, we must remember that the geographic range of a species can change as the circumstances change.
The Aotearoa marine ecosystem will move many new species in the habitable area, which makes research of the last hot period larger than ever.
We would like to thank our research co-author in Ksepka for The Bruce MuseumKerr Sharpe-Young for having discovered the fossil, and Ngāti Ruanui and Ngāruahine to support the collection and search for fossils of their Rohe.
This published article is republished from The conversation Under a creative communs license. Read it original article.
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