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131-494: The Snowmastodon site , also known as the Ziegler Reservoir fossil site , is the location of an important Ice Age fossil excavation near Snowmass Village, Colorado . Fossils were first discovered on October 14, 2010, during the construction of a 5 hectares (12 acres) reservoir to supply Snowmass Village with water. Over the subsequent weeks, after an agreement had been reached to allow paleontological excavation, crews from

262-719: A liver without a gallbladder . Deer also have a tapetum lucidum , which gives them sufficiently good night vision . All male deer have antlers , with the exception of the water deer , in which males have long tusk-like canines that reach below the lower jaw. Females generally lack antlers, though female reindeer bear antlers smaller and less branched than those of the males. Occasionally females in other species may develop antlers, especially in telemetacarpal deer such as European roe deer, red deer, white-tailed deer and mule deer and less often in plesiometacarpal deer. A study of antlered female white-tailed deer noted that antlers tend to be small and malformed, and are shed frequently around

393-406: A broad central portion), white-tailed deer antlers include a series of tines sprouting upward from a forward-curving main beam, and those of the pudú are mere spikes. Antler development begins from the pedicel, a bony structure that appears on the top of the skull by the time the animal is a year old. The pedicel gives rise to a spiky antler the following year, that is replaced by a branched antler in

524-453: A disease which in the UK in 2005 cost £90 million in attempts to eradicate. In New Zealand, deer are thought to be important as vectors picking up M. bovis in areas where brushtail possums Trichosurus vulpecula are infected, and transferring it to previously uninfected possums when their carcasses are scavenged elsewhere. The white-tailed deer Odocoileus virginianus has been confirmed as

655-543: A horse, and various smaller vertebrates. A small excavation crew from the museum remained at the site, in the event further discoveries were made in the course of the dam construction. The speed at which the fossils were recovered (more or less seven weeks) is remarkable for a scientific dig of this size. Kirk R. Johnson, leader of the Snowmastodon Project on behalf of the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, told

786-1304: A lesser extent in the Southern Hemisphere. They have different names, historically developed and depending on their geographic distributions: Fraser (in the Pacific Cordillera of North America), Pinedale (in the Central Rocky Mountains ), Wisconsinan or Wisconsin (in central North America), Devensian (in the British Isles), Midlandian (in Ireland), Würm (in the Alps ), Mérida (in Venezuela ), Weichselian or Vistulian (in Northern Europe and northern Central Europe), Valdai in Russia and Zyryanka in Siberia , Llanquihue in Chile , and Otira in New Zealand. The geochronological Late Pleistocene includes

917-687: A mammoth using sources he found on the internet. The next morning, Kit Hamby, the district manager for the Snowmass Water and Sanitation District (SWSD), contacted a contractor from the Colorado Geological Survey who contacted the Denver Museum of Nature & Science (DMNS). The DMNS reached an agreement with the SWSD to allow the museum to excavate the fossils. Crews from the Denver Museum, U.S. Geological Survey, and several other institutions work alongside bulldozers for two weeks in order to salvage

1048-500: A nearly complete skeleton of Diacodexis discovered in 1982 gave rise to speculation that this ancestor could be closer to the non-ruminants than the ruminants. Andromeryx is another prominent prehistoric ruminant, but appears to be closer to the tragulids . The formation of the Himalayas and the Alps brought about significant geographic changes. This was the chief reason behind the extensive diversification of deer-like forms and

1179-543: A result of acclimatisation society releases in the 19th century, Australia has six introduced species of deer that have established sustainable wild populations. They are fallow deer, red deer, sambar, hog deer, rusa , and chital. Red deer were introduced into New Zealand in 1851 from English and Scottish stock. Many have been domesticated in deer farms since the late 1960s and are common farm animals there now. Seven other species of deer were introduced into New Zealand but none are as widespread as red deer. Deer constitute

1310-513: A result of melting ice, the land has continued to rise yearly in Scandinavia, mostly in northern Sweden and Finland, where the land is rising at a rate of as much as 8–9 mm per year, or 1 m in 100 years. This is important for archaeologists, since a site that was coastal in the Nordic Stone Age now is inland and can be dated by its relative distance from the present shore. The term Würm

1441-451: A ridge 8,875 feet (2,705 m) above sea level. The lake basin was formed when a glacier flowing down Snowmass Creek Valley became thick enough to overtop the adjacent ridgeline. As the glacier retreated, a moraine impounded a 5 hectare alpine lake that was initially 10 meters deep. Over time, the lake filled in with wind-blown sediments until it became a marshland and ultimately an alpine meadow. After Doug Ziegler and his family purchased

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1572-452: A single ice age given the continual presence of ice sheets near both poles. Glacials are somewhat better defined, as colder phases during which glaciers advance, separated by relatively warm interglacials . The end of the last glacial period, which was about 10,000 years ago, is often called the end of the ice age, although extensive year-round ice persists in Antarctica and Greenland . Over

1703-471: A single location, including the largest mastodon ever found. The fossil flora offer unprecedented insights into plant biogeography of the Rocky Mountains during the last interglacial period. The site is also important for the exceptional preservation of fossil material. Fossil sedge and willow leaves were still green, conifer cones were still intact, and large driftwood logs were preserved. In addition,

1834-485: A smaller form, but a combination of anthropogenic and climatic pressures is now thought to be the most likely culprit. Meanwhile, the moose and reindeer radiated into North America from Siberia. Deer constitute the artiodactyl family Cervidae. This family was first described by German zoologist Georg August Goldfuss in Handbuch der Zoologie (1820). Three subfamilies were recognised: Capreolinae (first described by

1965-762: A still lesser extent, glaciers existed in Africa, for example in the High Atlas , the mountains of Morocco , the Mount Atakor massif in southern Algeria , and several mountains in Ethiopia . Just south of the equator, an ice cap of several hundred square kilometers was present on the east African mountains in the Kilimanjaro massif , Mount Kenya , and the Rwenzori Mountains , which still bear relic glaciers today. Glaciation of

2096-783: A wide variety of vegetation. The teeth of deer are adapted to feeding on vegetation, and like other ruminants, they lack upper incisors , instead having a tough pad at the front of their upper jaw. Deer are browsers , and feed primarily on foliage of grasses , sedges , forbs , shrubs and trees , secondarily on lichens in northern latitudes during winter. They have small, unspecialized stomachs by ruminant standards, and high nutrition requirements. Rather than eating and digesting vast quantities of low-grade fibrous food as, for example, sheep and cattle do, deer select easily digestible shoots, young leaves, fresh grasses, soft twigs, fruit, fungi , and lichens . The low-fibered food, after minimal fermentation and shredding, passes rapidly through

2227-492: A wild animal of any kind. Cognates of Old English dēor in other dead Germanic languages have the general sense of animal , such as Old High German tior , Old Norse djur or dȳr , Gothic dius , Old Saxon dier , and Old Frisian diar . This general sense gave way to the modern English sense by the end of the Middle English period, around 1500. All modern Germanic languages save English and Scots retain

2358-594: Is derived from a river in the Alpine foreland, roughly marking the maximum glacier advance of this particular glacial period. The Alps were where the first systematic scientific research on ice ages was conducted by Louis Agassiz at the beginning of the 19th century. Here, the Würm glaciation of the LGP was intensively studied. Pollen analysis , the statistical analyses of microfossilized plant pollens found in geological deposits, chronicled

2489-508: Is from Latin : cervus , meaning ' stag ' or ' deer ' . Deer live in a variety of biomes , ranging from tundra to the tropical rainforest . While often associated with forests, many deer are ecotone species that live in transitional areas between forests and thickets (for cover) and prairie and savanna (open space). The majority of large deer species inhabit temperate mixed deciduous forest, mountain mixed coniferous forest, tropical seasonal/dry forest, and savanna habitats around

2620-523: Is one of the few localities in North America from the Sangamonian Stage , and the only one at high elevation. This site preserves multiple alpine ecosystems stacked on top of each other within sediments of ancient alpine lake. Among the vertebrate fauna, this site represents highest known elevations of a number of species. Additionally, this site holds the record for the most mastodons preserved in

2751-452: Is only slightly taller and heavier. Sexual dimorphism is quite pronounced – in most species males tend to be larger than females, and, except for the reindeer, only males have antlers. Coat colour generally varies between red and brown, though it can be as dark as chocolate brown in the tufted deer or have a grayish tinge as in elk. Different species of brocket deer vary from gray to reddish brown in coat colour. Several species such as

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2882-412: Is strong enough to walk with its mother. The fawn and its mother stay together for about one year. A male usually leaves and never sees his mother again, but females sometimes come back with their own fawns and form small herds. In some areas of the UK, deer (especially fallow deer due to their gregarious behaviour ) have been implicated as a possible reservoir for transmission of bovine tuberculosis ,

3013-501: Is the moose , which is nearly 2.6 metres (8 ft 6 in) tall and weighs up to 800 kilograms (1,800 lb). The elk stands 1.4–2 metres (4 ft 7 in – 6 ft 7 in) at the shoulder and weighs 240–450 kilograms (530–990 lb). The northern pudu is the smallest deer in the world; it reaches merely 32–35 centimetres ( 12 + 1 ⁄ 2 –14 in) at the shoulder and weighs 3.3–6 kilograms ( 7 + 1 ⁄ 4 – 13 + 1 ⁄ 4  lb). The southern pudu

3144-629: The Barbary stag , a subspecies of red deer that is confined to the Atlas Mountains in the northwest of the continent. Another extinct species of deer, Megaceroides algericus , was present in North Africa until 6000 years ago. Fallow deer have been introduced to South Africa . Small species of brocket deer and pudús of Central and South America , and muntjacs of Asia generally occupy dense forests and are less often seen in open spaces, with

3275-487: The Caucasus Mountains have forest areas that are not only home to sizable deer populations but also other animals that were once abundant such as the wisent, Eurasian lynx , Iberian lynx , wolves , and brown bears . The highest concentration of large deer species in temperate Asia occurs in the mixed deciduous forests, mountain coniferous forests, and taiga bordering North Korea, Manchuria (Northeastern China), and

3406-462: The Denver Museum of Nature & Science and the U.S. Geological Survey worked along with the construction crews as more fossil material was uncovered. The site closed for five months over the winter, reopening May 15, 2011. Between May 15 and July 4, 2011, crews from the Denver Museum of Nature & Science conducted a large scale fossil excavation alongside construction crews building a dam for

3537-585: The Lesotho Highlands and parts of the Drakensberg . The development of glaciers was likely aided in part due to shade provided by adjacent cliffs. Various moraines and former glacial niches have been identified in the eastern Lesotho Highlands a few kilometres west of the Great Escarpment , at altitudes greater than 3,000 m on south-facing slopes. Studies suggest that the annual average temperature in

3668-697: The Owen Stanley Range , and the Saruwaged Range . Mount Giluwe in the Central Cordillera had a "more or less continuous ice cap covering about 188 km and extending down to 3200-3500 m". In Western New Guinea , remnants of these glaciers are still preserved atop Puncak Jaya and Ngga Pilimsit . Small glaciers developed in a few favorable places in Southern Africa during the last glacial period. These small glaciers would have been located in

3799-615: The Pleistocene have been excavated in China and the Himalayas. While Cervus and Dama appeared nearly 3 Mya, Axis emerged during the late Pliocene–Pleistocene. The tribes Capreolini and Rangiferini appeared around 4–7 Mya. Around 5 Mya, the rangiferina † Bretzia and † Eocoileus were the first cervids to reach North America. This implies the Bering Strait could be crossed during

3930-926: The Sami people of Finland and Scandinavia, the Tungusic peoples, Mongolians, and Turkic peoples of Southern Siberia, Northern Mongolia, and the Ussuri Region have also taken to raising semi-domesticated herds of Asian caribou. The highest concentration of large deer species in the tropics occurs in Southern Asia in India's Indo-Gangetic Plain Region and Nepal 's Terai Region. These fertile plains consist of tropical seasonal moist deciduous, dry deciduous forests, and both dry and wet savannas that are home to chital , hog deer , barasingha , Indian sambar , and Indian muntjac . Grazing species such as

4061-688: The Sierra Nevada in northern California . In northern Eurasia, the Scandinavian ice sheet once again reached the northern parts of the British Isles , Germany , Poland , and Russia, extending as far east as the Taymyr Peninsula in western Siberia. The maximum extent of western Siberian glaciation was reached by about 18,000 to 17,000 BP, later than in Europe (22,000–18,000 BP). Northeastern Siberia

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4192-526: The Tethys Ocean disappeared to give way to vast stretches of grassland; these provided the deer with abundant protein-rich vegetation that led to the development of ornamental antlers and allowed populations to flourish and colonise areas. As antlers had become pronounced, the canines were either lost or became poorly represented (as in elk), probably because diet was no longer browse -dominated and antlers were better display organs. In muntjac and tufted deer,

4323-702: The Upper Mississippi River , which in turn was formed during an earlier glacial period. In its retreat, the Wisconsin episode glaciation left terminal moraines that form Long Island , Block Island , Cape Cod , Nomans Land , Martha's Vineyard , Nantucket , Sable Island , and the Oak Ridges Moraine in south-central Ontario, Canada. In Wisconsin itself, it left the Kettle Moraine . The drumlins and eskers formed at its melting edge are landmarks of

4454-521: The Younger Dryas , began around 12,800 years ago and ended around 11,700 years ago, also marking the end of the LGP and the Pleistocene epoch. It was followed by the Holocene , the current geological epoch . The LGP is often colloquially referred to as the "last ice age", though the term ice age is not strictly defined, and on a longer geological perspective, the last few million years could be termed

4585-494: The coat of arms of Åland . Their economic importance includes the use of their meat as venison , their skins as soft, strong buckskin , and their antlers as handles for knives. Deer hunting has been a popular activity since the Middle Ages and remains a resource for many families today. The word deer was originally broad in meaning, becoming more specific with time. Old English dēor and Middle English der meant

4716-472: The family Cervidae (informally the deer family ). Cervidae is divided into subfamilies Cervinae (which includes, among others, muntjac , elk (wapiti), red deer , and fallow deer ) and Capreolinae (which includes, among others reindeer (caribou), white-tailed deer , roe deer , and moose ). Male deer of almost all species (except the water deer ), as well as female reindeer, grow and shed new antlers each year. These antlers are bony extensions of

4847-508: The grooves left by these glaciers can be easily observed. In southwestern Saskatchewan and southeastern Alberta, a suture zone between the Laurentide and Cordilleran ice sheets formed the Cypress Hills , which is the northernmost point in North America that remained south of the continental ice sheets. The Great Lakes are the result of glacial scour and pooling of meltwater at the rim of

4978-576: The isostatically depressed area, a temporary marine incursion that geologists dub the Yoldia Sea . Then, as postglacial isostatic rebound lifted the region about 9500 BP, the deepest basin of the Baltic became a freshwater lake, in palaeological contexts referred to as Ancylus Lake , which is identifiable in the freshwater fauna found in sediment cores. The lake was filled by glacial runoff, but as worldwide sea level continued rising, saltwater again breached

5109-493: The merycodontines eventually gave rise to the modern pronghorn. The Cervinae emerged as the first group of extant cervids around 7–9 Mya, during the late Miocene in central Asia. The tribe Muntiacini made its appearance as † Muntiacus leilaoensis around 7–8 Mya; The early muntjacs varied in size–as small as hares or as large as fallow deer. They had tusks for fighting and antlers for defence. Capreolinae followed soon after; Alceini appeared 6.4–8.4 Mya. Around this period,

5240-464: The photoperiod . Deer are also excellent jumpers and swimmers. Deer are ruminants , or cud-chewers, and have a four-chambered stomach. Some deer, such as those on the island of Rùm , do consume meat when it is available. Nearly all deer have a facial gland in front of each eye. The gland contains a strongly scented pheromone , used to mark its home range. Bucks of a wide range of species open these glands wide when angry or excited. All deer have

5371-687: The Alpine foreland . Local ice fields or small ice sheets could be found capping the highest massifs of the Pyrenees , the Carpathian Mountains , the Balkan Mountains , the Caucasus , and the mountains of Turkey and Iran . In the Himalayas and the Tibetan Plateau , there is evidence that glaciers advanced considerably, particularly between 47,000 and 27,000 BP, but the exact ages, as well as

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5502-536: The British Columbia side, and Banff National Park , Jasper National Park , and Glacier National Park (U.S.) on the Alberta and Montana sides. Mountain slope habitats vary from moist coniferous/mixed forested habitats to dry subalpine/pine forests with alpine meadows higher up. The foothills and river valleys between the mountain ranges provide a mosaic of cropland and deciduous parklands. The rare woodland caribou have

5633-725: The Center for Arctic Gas Hydrate, Environment and Climate at the University of Tromsø , published a study in June 2017 describing over a hundred ocean sediment craters, some 3,000 m wide and up to 300 m deep, formed by explosive eruptions of methane from destabilized methane hydrates , following ice-sheet retreat during the LGP, around 12,000 years ago. These areas around the Barents Sea still seep methane today. The study hypothesized that existing bulges containing methane reservoirs could eventually have

5764-502: The Cervidae, are believed to have evolved from Diacodexis , the earliest known artiodactyl (even-toed ungulate), 50–55 Mya in the Eocene. Diacodexis , nearly the size of a rabbit , featured the talus bone characteristic of all modern even-toed ungulates . This ancestor and its relatives occurred throughout North America and Eurasia, but were on the decline by at least 46 Mya. Analysis of

5895-460: The English zoologist Joshua Brookes in 1828), Cervinae (described by Goldfuss) and Hydropotinae (first described by French zoologist Édouard Louis Trouessart in 1898). Other attempts at the classification of deer have been based on morphological and genetic differences. The Anglo-Irish naturalist Victor Brooke suggested in 1878 that deer could be bifurcated into two classes on the according to

6026-696: The European Dremotherium ; these sabre-toothed animals are believed to have been the direct ancestors of all modern antlered deer, though they themselves lacked antlers. Another contemporaneous form was the four-horned protoceratid Protoceras , that was replaced by Syndyoceras in the Miocene; these animals were unique in having a horn on the nose. Late Eocene fossils dated approximately 35 million years ago, which were found in North America, show that Syndyoceras had bony skull outgrowths that resembled non-deciduous antlers. Fossil evidence suggests that

6157-585: The Greenland climate was dry during the LGP, with precipitation reaching perhaps only 20% of today's value. The name Mérida glaciation is proposed to designate the alpine glaciation that affected the central Venezuelan Andes during the Late Pleistocene. Two main moraine levels have been recognized - one with an elevation of 2,600–2,700 m (8,500–8,900 ft), and another with an elevation of 3,000–3,500 m (9,800–11,500 ft). The snow line during

6288-673: The Ice Ages, but afterwards became restricted primarily to the Anatolian Peninsula, in present-day Turkey. Present-day fallow deer populations in Europe are a result of historic man-made introductions of this species, first to the Mediterranean regions of Europe, then eventually to the rest of Europe. They were initially park animals that later escaped and reestablished themselves in the wild. Historically, Europe's deer species shared their deciduous forest habitat with other herbivores, such as

6419-623: The Indian Subcontinent) boasts the most species of deer in the world, with most species being found in Asia. Europe, in comparison, has lower diversity in plant and animal species. Many national parks and protected reserves in Europe have populations of red deer, roe deer , and fallow deer. These species have long been associated with the continent of Europe, but also inhabit Asia Minor , the Caucasus Mountains , and Northwestern Iran . "European" fallow deer historically lived over much of Europe during

6550-976: The LGP as the Devensian . Irish geologists, geographers, and archaeologists refer to the Midlandian glaciation, as its effects in Ireland are largely visible in the Irish Midlands . The name Devensian is derived from the Latin Dēvenses , people living by the Dee ( Dēva in Latin), a river on the Welsh border near which deposits from the period are particularly well represented. The effects of this glaciation can be seen in many geological features of England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland . Its deposits have been found overlying material from

6681-495: The Last Glacial Period in some areas such as Britain, but less severe in others. The last glacial period saw alternating episodes of glacier advance and retreat with the Last Glacial Maximum occurring between 26,000 and 20,000 years ago. While the general pattern of cooling and glacier advance around the globe was similar, local differences make it difficult to compare the details from continent to continent (see picture of ice core data below for differences). The most recent cooling,

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6812-443: The New York Times, "The speed of this thing is so unlike normal science — from discovery to completion of one of the biggest digs ever in less than nine months." Scientists are not concerned now that the site is covered by water after completion of the reservoir expansion. Being underwater helps preserve the fossils and the reservoir can be drained if ever the need arises for additional excavations. The Ziegler Reservoir fossil site

6943-505: The North American Laurentide ice sheet. At the height of glaciation, the Bering land bridge potentially permitted migration of mammals, including people, to North America from Siberia . It radically altered the geography of North America north of the Ohio River . At the height of the Wisconsin episode glaciation, ice covered most of Canada, the Upper Midwest , and New England , as well as parts of Montana and Washington . On Kelleys Island in Lake Erie or in New York's Central Park ,

7074-410: The Polish River Vistula or its German name Weichsel). Evidence suggests that the ice sheets were at their maximum size for only a short period, between 25,000 and 13,000 BP. Eight interstadials have been recognized in the Weichselian, including the Oerel, Glinde, Moershoofd, Hengelo, and Denekamp. Correlation with isotope stages is still in process. During the glacial maximum in Scandinavia, only

7205-428: The Snowmass Water and Sanitation District (SWSD) to expand the Ziegler Reservoir and provide additional water supplies to the nearby town of Snowmass Village . While clearing the perimeter of the reservoir, bulldozer operator Jesse Steele unearthed the first animal bones. Recognizing them as possible fossils, Steele informed project foreman, Kent Olson. Olsen took the bones home and identified them as belonging to

7336-437: The Southern Hemisphere was less extensive. Ice sheets existed in the Andes ( Patagonian Ice Sheet ), where six glacier advances between 33,500 and 13,900 BP in the Chilean Andes have been reported. Antarctica was entirely glaciated, much like today, but unlike today the ice sheet left no uncovered area. In mainland Australia only a very small area in the vicinity of Mount Kosciuszko was glaciated, whereas in Tasmania glaciation

7467-486: The Ussuri Region (Russia). These are among some of the richest deciduous and coniferous forests in the world where one can find Siberian roe deer , sika deer , elk, and moose. Asian caribou occupy the northern fringes of this region along the Sino-Russian border. Deer such as the sika deer, Thorold's deer , Central Asian red deer , and elk have historically been farmed for their antlers by Han Chinese , Turkic peoples , Tungusic peoples , Mongolians , and Koreans . Like

7598-452: The Wisconsin episode. It began about 30,000 years ago, reached its greatest advance 21,000 years ago, and ended about 10,000 years ago. In northwest Greenland, ice coverage attained a very early maximum in the LGP around 114,000. After this early maximum, ice coverage was similar to today until the end of the last glacial period. Towards the end, glaciers advanced once more before retreating to their present extent. According to ice core data,

7729-407: The alimentary canal. The deer require a large amount of minerals such as calcium and phosphate in order to support antler growth, and this further necessitates a nutrient-rich diet. There are some reports of deer engaging in carnivorous activity, such as eating dead alewives along lakeshores or depredating the nests of northern bobwhites . Nearly all cervids are so-called uniparental species:

7860-508: The antlers as well as the canines are small. The tragulids have long canines to this day. With the onset of the Pliocene , the global climate became cooler. A fall in the sea-level led to massive glaciation; consequently, grasslands abounded in nutritious forage. Thus a new spurt in deer populations ensued. The oldest member of Cervini, † Cervocerus novorossiae , appeared around the transition from Miocene to Pliocene (4.2–6 Mya) in Eurasia; cervine fossils from early Pliocene to as late as

7991-797: The antlers create grooves that allow another male's antlers to lock into place. This allows the males to wrestle without risking injury to the face. Antlers are correlated to an individual's position in the social hierarchy and its behaviour. For instance, the heavier the antlers, the higher the individual's status in the social hierarchy, and the greater the delay in shedding the antlers; males with larger antlers tend to be more aggressive and dominant over others. Antlers can be an honest signal of genetic quality; males with larger antlers relative to body size tend to have increased resistance to pathogens and higher reproductive capacity. In elk in Yellowstone National Park , antlers also provide protection against predation by wolves . Homology of tines, that is,

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8122-415: The arrival of winter prevented any further excavation. The site and fossils left in situ were protected with frost-free barrier and the recovered fossils taken to the conservation laboratory of the DMNS. More than 600 bones and 130 plant, rock, and invertebrate samples were recovered, including the first mastodon skull ever recovered in Colorado (unearthed a mere day after the beginning of the excavation) and

8253-450: The basis of diploid number of chromosomes in the late 20th century has been flawed by several inconsistencies. In 1987, the zoologists Colin Groves and Peter Grubb identified three subfamilies: Cervinae, Hydropotinae and Odocoileinae; they noted that the hydropotines lack antlers, and the other two subfamilies differ in their skeletal morphology. They reverted from this classification in 2000. Molecular phylogenetic analyses since

8384-401: The beginning of the Holocene , c.  115,000  – c.  11,700 years ago, and thus corresponds to most of the timespan of the Late Pleistocene . The LGP is part of a larger sequence of glacial and interglacial periods known as the Quaternary glaciation which started around 2,588,000 years ago and is ongoing. The glaciation and the current Quaternary Period both began with

8515-692: The branching structure of antlers among species, have been discussed before the 1900s. Recently, a new method to describe the branching structure of antlers and determining homology of tines was developed. Most deer bear 32 teeth; the corresponding dental formula is: 0.0.3.3 3.1.3.3 . The elk and the reindeer may be exceptions, as they may retain their upper canines and thus have 34 teeth (dental formula: 0.1.3.3 3.1.3.3 ). The Chinese water deer, tufted deer, and muntjac have enlarged upper canine teeth forming sharp tusks, while other species often lack upper canines altogether. The cheek teeth of deer have crescent ridges of enamel, which enable them to grind

8646-405: The chital, the fallow deer and the sika deer feature white spots on a brown coat. Coat of reindeer shows notable geographical variation. Deer undergo two moults in a year; for instance, in red deer the red, thin-haired summer coat is gradually replaced by the dense, greyish brown winter coat in autumn, which in turn gives way to the summer coat in the following spring. Moulting is affected by

8777-448: The climatic oscillations during the time represented by the samples. Sediments containing terrestrial and aquatic mollusks and ostracods span 130,000 to 87,000 years ago. These sediments produced 12 identifiable taxa of terrestrial gastropods, 5 taxa of aquatic bivalves, 8 taxa of aquatic gastropods, along with 7 taxa of ostracodes. These taxa indicate that the ancient lakeshore was a shallow, well-vegetated, fresh water wetland during

8908-459: The construction of Ziegler Reservoir. These taxa represent a diverse assemblage of fauna belonging to the Rancholabrean North American Land Mammal Age . The smaller vertebrate species include: trout , frog , salamander , snake , lizard , duck , goose , pheasant , crane , finch , shrew , river otter , bear , coyote , rabbit , chipmunk , squirrel , beaver , mice and other small rodents . The most abundant species found throughout

9039-400: The dramatic changes in the European environment during the Würm glaciation. During the height of Würm glaciation, c.  24,000  – c.  10,000  BP, most of western and central Europe and Eurasia was open steppe-tundra, while the Alps presented solid ice fields and montane glaciers. Scandinavia and much of Britain were under ice. During the Würm, the Rhône Glacier covered

9170-417: The earliest members of the superfamily Cervoidea appeared in Eurasia in the Miocene. Dicrocerus , Euprox and Heteroprox were probably the first antlered cervids. Dicrocerus featured single-forked antlers that were shed regularly. Stephanocemas had more developed and diffuse ("crowned") antlers. Procervulus ( Palaeomerycidae ) also had antlers that were not shed. Contemporary forms such as

9301-594: The early Eocene , and gradually developed into the first antlered cervoids (the superfamily of cervids and related extinct families) in the Miocene . Eventually, with the development of antlers, the tusks as well as the upper incisors disappeared. Thus, evolution of deer took nearly 30 million years. Biologist Valerius Geist suggests evolution to have occurred in stages. There are not many prominent fossils to trace this evolution, but only fragments of skeletons and antlers that might be easily confused with false antlers of non-cervid species. The ruminants , ancestors of

9432-686: The early Pleistocene, probably as a result of abundant resources to drive evolution. The early Pleistocene cervid † Eucladoceros was comparable in size to the modern elk. † Megaloceros (Pliocene–Pleistocene) featured the Irish elk ( M. giganteus ), one of the largest known cervids . The Irish elk reached 2 metres ( 6 + 1 ⁄ 2  ft) at the shoulder and had heavy antlers that spanned 3.6 metres (11 ft 10 in) from tip to tip. These large animals were traditionally thought to have faced extinction due to conflict between sexual selection for large antlers and body and natural selection for

9563-654: The ecological niches of the ibex and wild goat , with the fawns behaving more like goat kids. The highest concentration of large deer species in temperate North America lies in the Canadian Rocky Mountain and Columbia Mountain regions between Alberta and British Columbia where all five North American deer species ( white-tailed deer , mule deer , caribou , elk , and moose ) can be found. This region has several clusters of national parks including Mount Revelstoke National Park , Glacier National Park (Canada) , Yoho National Park , and Kootenay National Park on

9694-418: The efforts had been dubbed, cost approximately $ 1 million, including public outreach programs. Half of the costs were covered by grants and gifts to the museum, while the rest came from donations. The first scientific excavation officially began on November 2, 2010. It involved 67 workers from the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, and lasted 12 days. Preliminary efforts concluded on November 14, 2010, when

9825-727: The emergence of cervids from the Oligocene to the early Pliocene . The latter half of the Oligocene (28–34 Mya) saw the appearance of the European Eumeryx and the North American Leptomeryx . The latter resembled modern-day bovids and cervids in dental morphology (for instance, it had brachyodont molars), while the former was more advanced . Other deer-like forms included the North American Blastomeryx and

9956-410: The end of their first winter. In the first twenty minutes of a fawn's life, the fawn begins to take its first steps. Its mother licks it clean until it is almost free of scent, so predators will not find it. Its mother leaves often to graze, and the fawn does not like to be left behind. Sometimes its mother must gently push it down with her foot. The fawn stays hidden in the grass for one week until it

10087-745: The endangered barasingha and very common chital are gregarious and live in large herds. Indian sambar can be gregarious but are usually solitary or live in smaller herds. Hog deer are solitary and have lower densities than Indian muntjac. Deer can be seen in several national parks in India, Nepal, and Sri Lanka of which Kanha National Park , Dudhwa National Park , and Chitwan National Park are most famous. Sri Lanka's Wilpattu National Park and Yala National Park have large herds of Indian sambar and chital. The Indian sambar are more gregarious in Sri Lanka than other parts of their range and tend to form larger herds than elsewhere. The Chao Praya River Valley of Thailand

10218-950: The extinct tarpan (forest horse), extinct aurochs (forest ox), and the endangered wisent (European bison). Good places to see deer in Europe include the Scottish Highlands , the Austrian Alps , the wetlands between Austria , Hungary , and the Czech Republic , and some National Parks, including Doñana National Park in Spain , the Veluwe in the Netherlands , the Ardennes in Belgium , and Białowieża National Park in Poland . Spain , Eastern Europe , and

10349-417: The features of the second and fifth metacarpal bones of their forelimbs: Plesiometacarpalia (most Old World deer) and Telemetacarpalia (most New World deer). He treated the musk deer as a cervid, placing it under Telemetacarpalia. While the telemetacarpal deer showed only those elements located far from the joint, the plesiometacarpal deer retained the elements closer to the joint as well. Differentiation on

10480-501: The fine-grained quartz provided reliable, replicable ages for the sediments within the established 45,000 – 140,000 time frame. The dates obtained via OSL correlate with the end of the Bull Lake glaciation and the Sangamon interglacial stage , spanning marine isotope stages 6 through 4. Over 36,000 bones and teeth belonging to 52 taxa of macro- and microvertebrates were uncovered during

10611-667: The first remains of a Jefferson's ground sloth to be found in the state. Other megafauna recovered included giant bison , two deer -like animals, and more mammoths. Excavations resumed during spring of 2011, from May 15 to July 4, with the support and permission of SWSD and the State of Colorado. By the end of July, the total number of bones recovered was around 36,000, from at least 52 different Ice Age vertebrate animals. Approximately 3,000 of them are believed to come from mastodons of both sexes and of varying ages, from infants to full adults. Other new animals recovered included an Ice Age camel,

10742-523: The foothills and river valley bottoms of the Canadian Rockies owing to conversion of land to cropland and the clearing of coniferous forests allowing more deciduous vegetation to grow up the mountain slopes. They also live in the aspen parklands north of Calgary and Edmonton, where they share habitat with the moose. The adjacent Great Plains grassland habitats are left to herds of elk, American bison , and pronghorn . The Eurasian Continent (including

10873-598: The formation of a single contiguous ice sheet on the Tibetan Plateau, is controversial. Other areas of the Northern Hemisphere did not bear extensive ice sheets, but local glaciers were widespread at high altitudes. Parts of Taiwan , for example, were repeatedly glaciated between 44,250 and 10,680 BP as well as the Japanese Alps . In both areas, maximum glacier advance occurred between 60,000 and 30,000 BP. To

11004-575: The formation of the Arctic ice cap . The Antarctic ice sheet began to form earlier, at about 34 Mya, in the mid- Cenozoic ( Eocene–Oligocene extinction event ), and the term Late Cenozoic Ice Age is used to include this early phase with the current glaciation. The previous ice age within the Quaternary is the Penultimate Glacial Period , which ended about 128,000 years ago, was more severe than

11135-604: The increasing number of fossils being unearthed. The onset of winter caused the site to be closed for five months beginning November 15. When the excavation resumed on May 15, 2011, museum crews had 7 weeks to complete the excavation in order for the reservoir project to be completed on time. By the time excavation had been completed, the team consisting of more than 250 volunteers and 40 project scientists removed approximately 8000 cubic meters of sediment. Thousands of fossils were collected along with stratigraphic, geochronologic, palynologic, paleoentomologic, and paleobotanic data that

11266-539: The land that now contains the Ziegler Reservoir, they commissioned the construction of a small earthen dam in 1961 to block the meadow drainage and form a shallow, private lake that persisted until the Snowmass Water and Sanitation District bought the water rights in 2010. Several dating techniques were employed in order to determine the age of the ancient lake sediments. Attempts at radiocarbon dating of lake organics, bone collagen and shell carbonate, revealed that

11397-499: The last glacial advance was lowered approximately 1,200 m (3,900 ft) below the present snow line, which is 3,700 m (12,100 ft). The glaciated area in the Cordillera de Mérida was about 600 km (230 sq mi); this included these high areas, from southwest to northeast: Páramo de Tamá, Páramo Batallón, Páramo Los Conejos, Páramo Piedras Blancas, and Teta de Niquitao. Around 200 km (77 sq mi) of

11528-545: The last glacial maximum, the Patagonian ice sheet extended over the Andes from about 35°S to Tierra del Fuego at 55°S. The western part appears to have been very active, with wet basal conditions, while the eastern part was cold-based. Cryogenic features such as ice wedges , patterned ground , pingos , rock glaciers , palsas , soil cryoturbation , and solifluction deposits developed in unglaciated extra-Andean Patagonia during

11659-429: The last glaciation, but not all these reported features have been verified. The area west of Llanquihue Lake was ice-free during the last glacial maximum, and had sparsely distributed vegetation dominated by Nothofagus . Valdivian temperate rain forest was reduced to scattered remnants on the western side of the Andes. Deer A deer ( pl. : deer) or true deer is a hoofed ruminant ungulate of

11790-499: The late Miocene–Pliocene; this appears highly probable as the camelids migrated into Asia from North America around the same time. Deer invaded South America in the late Pliocene (2.5–3 Mya) as part of the Great American Interchange , thanks to the recently formed Isthmus of Panama , and emerged successful due to the small number of competing ruminants in the continent. Large deer with impressive antlers evolved during

11921-550: The late glacial (Weichselian) and the immediately preceding penultimate interglacial ( Eemian ) period. Canada was almost completely covered by ice, as was the northern part of the United States , both blanketed by the huge Laurentide Ice Sheet . Alaska remained mostly ice free due to arid climate conditions. Local glaciations existed in the Rocky Mountains and the Cordilleran ice sheet and as ice fields and ice caps in

12052-450: The latter half of the 2000s all show that hydropotes is a sister taxon of Capreolus , and “Hydropotinae” became outdated subfamily. Until 2003, it was understood that the family Moschidae (musk deer) was sister to Cervidae. Then a phylogenetic study by Alexandre Hassanin (of National Museum of Natural History, France ) and colleagues, based on mitochondrial and nuclear analyses, revealed that Moschidae and Bovidae form

12183-450: The lower Connecticut River Valley . In the Sierra Nevada , three stages of glacial maxima, sometimes incorrectly called ice ages , were separated by warmer periods. These glacial maxima are called, from oldest to youngest, Tahoe, Tenaya, and Tioga. The Tahoe reached its maximum extent perhaps about 70,000 years ago. Little is known about the Tenaya. The Tioga was the least severe and last of

12314-448: The main Wisconsin glacial advance. The upper level probably represents the last glacial advance (Late Wisconsin). The Llanquihue glaciation takes its name from Llanquihue Lake in southern Chile , which is a fan-shaped piedmont glacial lake. On the lake's western shores, large moraine systems occur, of which the innermost belong to the LGP. Llanquihue Lake's varves are a node point in southern Chile's varve geochronology . During

12445-399: The male of any species is a hart , especially if over five years old, and the female is a hind , especially if three or more years old. The young of small species is a fawn and of large species a calf ; a very small young may be a kid . A castrated male is a havier . A group of any species is a herd . The adjective of relation is cervine ; like the family name Cervidae , this

12576-479: The massive Missoula Floods . USGS geologists estimate that the cycle of flooding and reformation of the lake lasted an average of 55 years and that the floods occurred about 40 times over the 2,000-year period starting 15,000 years ago. Glacial lake outburst floods such as these are not uncommon today in Iceland and other places. The Wisconsin glacial episode was the last major advance of continental glaciers in

12707-574: The mollusks and gastropods showed color, and beetle parts were still iridescent. Vertebrate fossil material was in excellent condition as well. The National Geographic Society , which donated a $ 55,000 grant to the project, featured the site in the National Geographic Magazine . The science television series Nova broadcast an episode about the site in February, 2012. The Ziegler Reservoir occupies an unusual geologic setting on top of

12838-434: The more general sense: for example, Dutch / Frisian dier , German Tier , and Norwegian dyr mean ' animal ' . For many types of deer in modern English usage, the male is a buck and the female a doe , but the terms vary with dialect, and according to the size of the species. The male red deer is a stag , while for other large species the male is a bull , the female a cow , as in cattle. In older usage,

12969-413: The most restricted range living at higher altitudes in the subalpine meadows and alpine tundra areas of some of the mountain ranges. Elk and mule deer both migrate between the alpine meadows and lower coniferous forests and tend to be most common in this region. Elk also inhabit river valley bottomlands, which they share with White-tailed deer. The White-tailed deer have recently expanded their range within

13100-502: The mountains of Southern Africa was about 6 °C colder than at present, in line with temperature drops estimated for Tasmania and southern Patagonia during the same time. This resulted in an environment of relatively arid periglaciation without permafrost , but with deep seasonal freezing on south-facing slopes. Periglaciation in the eastern Drakensberg and Lesotho Highlands produced solifluction deposits and blockfields ; including blockstreams and stone garlands. Scientists from

13231-461: The past few million years, the glacial-interglacial cycles have been "paced" by periodic variations in the Earth's orbit via Milankovitch cycles . The LGP has been intensively studied in North America, northern Eurasia, the Himalayas , and other formerly glaciated regions around the world. The glaciations that occurred during this glacial period covered many areas, mainly in the Northern Hemisphere and to

13362-641: The possible exception of the Indian muntjac . There are also several species of deer that are highly specialized and live almost exclusively in mountains, grasslands, swamps, and "wet" savannas, or riparian corridors surrounded by deserts . Some deer have a circumpolar distribution in both North America and Eurasia . Examples include the caribou that live in Arctic tundra and taiga (boreal forests) and moose that inhabit taiga and adjacent areas. Huemul deer ( taruca and Chilean huemul ) of South America 's Andes fill

13493-719: The preceding Ipswichian stage and lying beneath those from the following Holocene , which is the current stage. This is sometimes called the Flandrian interglacial in Britain. The latter part of the Devensian includes pollen zones I–IV, the Allerød oscillation and Bølling oscillation , and the Oldest Dryas , Older Dryas , and Younger Dryas cold periods. Alternative names include Weichsel glaciation or Vistulian glaciation (referring to

13624-486: The proglacial rivers' shifting and redepositing gravels. Beneath the surface, they had profound and lasting influence on geothermal heat and the patterns of deep groundwater flow. The Pinedale (central Rocky Mountains) or Fraser (Cordilleran ice sheet) glaciation was the last of the major glaciations to appear in the Rocky Mountains in the United States. The Pinedale lasted from around 30,000 to 10,000 years ago, and

13755-517: The receding ice. When the enormous mass of the continental ice sheet retreated, the Great Lakes began gradually moving south due to isostatic rebound of the north shore. Niagara Falls is also a product of the glaciation, as is the course of the Ohio River, which largely supplanted the prior Teays River . With the assistance of several very broad glacial lakes, it released floods through the gorge of

13886-431: The reservoir. In total over 36,000 vertebrate fossils (including mammoths , mastodons , ground sloths , horses , camels and deer ), more than 100 species of fossil invertebrates and over 100 species of fossil plants were found in sediments deposited by an alpine lake during the last interglacial period . The fossil site was discovered on October 14, 2010, by Gould Construction Inc. crews who had been employed by

14017-402: The right spot and never really find it." Deer appear to be immune to this parasite; it passes through the digestive system and is excreted in the feces. The parasite is not screened by the moose intestine, and passes into the brain where damage is done that is externally apparent, both in behaviour and in gait. Deer, elk and moose in North America may suffer from chronic wasting disease , which

14148-399: The same fate. During the last glacial period, Antarctica was blanketed by a massive ice sheet, much as it is today. The ice covered all land areas and extended into the ocean onto the middle and outer continental shelf. Counterintuitively though, according to ice modeling done in 2002, ice over central East Antarctica was generally thinner than it is today. British geologists refer to

14279-417: The second most diverse family of artiodactyla after bovids. Though of a similar build, deer are strongly distinguished from antelopes by their antlers , which are temporary and regularly regrown unlike the permanent horns of bovids. Characteristics typical of deer include long, powerful legs, a diminutive tail and long ears. Deer exhibit a broad variation in physical proportions. The largest extant deer

14410-466: The sill about 8000 BP, forming a marine Littorina Sea , which was followed by another freshwater phase before the present brackish marine system was established. "At its present state of development, the marine life of the Baltic Sea is less than about 4000 years old", Drs. Thulin and Andrushaitis remarked when reviewing these sequences in 2003. Overlying ice had exerted pressure on the Earth's surface. As

14541-478: The site is the tiger salamander . Also represented in the Ziegler Reservoir are the remains of seven megafauna taxa. These taxa include: A total of 99 taxa of insect were identified from samples spanning the interval of 125,000 to 77,000 years ago. These fossils are the oldest known Pleistocene high elevation insect faunas from the Rocky Mountains . The fossil assemblages were dominated by beetles , ants , midges , and caddisflies , which were used to document

14672-462: The site was radiocarbon dead or greater than 45,000 years old. In situ cosmogenic beryllium and aluminum from a boulder that was part of the bounding moraine yielded an age of approximately 140,000 years old. Uranium-series dating of vertebrate fossils confirmed the age range of 45,000-140,000 years; however, the extremely low uranium concentrations limited the utility of that method. Optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) ages obtained from

14803-501: The skull and are often used for combat between males. The musk deer ( Moschidae ) of Asia and chevrotains ( Tragulidae ) of tropical African and Asian forests are separate families that are also in the ruminant clade Ruminantia ; they are not especially closely related to Cervidae. Deer appear in art from Paleolithic cave paintings onwards, and they have played a role in mythology , religion, and literature throughout history, as well as in heraldry , such as red deer that appear in

14934-516: The sole maintenance host in the Michigan outbreak of bovine tuberculosis which remains a significant barrier to the US nationwide eradication of the disease in livestock. Moose and deer can carry rabies . Docile moose may suffer from brain worm , a helminth which drills holes through the brain in its search for a suitable place to lay its eggs. A government biologist states that "They move around looking for

15065-476: The surrounding ice sheets. According to the sediment composition retrieved from deep-sea cores , even times of seasonally open waters must have occurred. Outside the main ice sheets, widespread glaciation occurred on the highest mountains of the Alpide belt . In contrast to the earlier glacial stages, the Würm glaciation was composed of smaller ice caps and mostly confined to valley glaciers, sending glacial lobes into

15196-574: The third year. This process of losing a set of antlers to develop a larger and more branched set continues for the rest of the life. The antlers emerge as soft tissues (known as velvet antlers ) and progressively harden into bony structures (known as hard antlers), following mineralisation and blockage of blood vessels in the tissue, from the tip to the base. Antlers might be one of the most exaggerated male secondary sexual characteristics , and are intended primarily for reproductive success through sexual selection and for combat. The tines (forks) on

15327-541: The time of parturition. The fallow deer and the various subspecies of the reindeer have the largest as well as the heaviest antlers, both in absolute terms as well as in proportion to body mass (an average of eight grams per kilogram of body mass); the tufted deer, on the other hand, has the smallest antlers of all deer, while the pudú has the lightest antlers with respect to body mass (0.6 g per kilogram of body mass). The structure of antlers show considerable variation; while fallow deer and elk antlers are palmate (with

15458-445: The time periods sampled. A diverse assemblage of plant macrofossils and pollen was collected during Snowmastodon. Approximately 99 taxa of plant macrofossil, including seeds , leaves , needles , cones , twigs and wood were identified. Over 300 specimens of fossil wood were collected ranging in size from small stems to logs greater than 50 cm in diameter and more than 10 m in length. The majority of wood fossils came from

15589-447: The total glaciated area was in the Sierra Nevada de Mérida , and of that amount, the largest concentration, 50 km (19 sq mi), was in the areas of Pico Bolívar , Pico Humboldt [4,942 m (16,214 ft)], and Pico Bonpland [4,983 m (16,348 ft)]. Radiocarbon dating indicates that the moraines are older than 10,000 BP, and probably older than 13,000 BP. The lower moraine level probably corresponds to

15720-452: The various Asian rhinoceros species, various antelope species (such as nilgai , four-horned antelope , blackbuck , and Indian gazelle in India), and wild oxen (such as wild Asian water buffalo , gaur , banteng , and kouprey ). One way that different herbivores can survive together in a given area is for each species to have different food preferences, although there may be some overlap. As

15851-589: The western parts of Jutland were ice-free, and a large part of what is today the North Sea was dry land connecting Jutland with Britain (see Doggerland ). The Baltic Sea , with its unique brackish water , is a result of meltwater from the Weichsel glaciation combining with saltwater from the North Sea when the straits between Sweden and Denmark opened. Initially, when the ice began melting about 10,300 BP, seawater filled

15982-713: The whole western Swiss plateau, reaching today's regions of Solothurn and Aargau. In the region of Bern, it merged with the Aar glacier. The Rhine Glacier is currently the subject of the most detailed studies. Glaciers of the Reuss and the Limmat advanced sometimes as far as the Jura. Montane and piedmont glaciers formed the land by grinding away virtually all traces of the older Günz and Mindel glaciation, by depositing base moraines and terminal moraines of different retraction phases and loess deposits, and by

16113-512: The world. Clearing open areas within forests to some extent may actually benefit deer populations by exposing the understory and allowing the types of grasses, weeds, and herbs to grow that deer like to eat. Access to adjacent croplands may also benefit deer. Adequate forest or brush cover must still be provided for populations to grow and thrive. Deer are widely distributed, with indigenous representatives in all continents except Antarctica and Australia , though Africa has only one native deer,

16244-542: The young, known in most species as fawns, are only cared for by the mother, most often called a doe. A doe generally has one or two fawns at a time (triplets, while not unknown, are uncommon). Mating season typically begins in later August and lasts until December. Some species mate until early March. The gestation period is anywhere up to ten months for the European roe deer. Most fawns are born with their fur covered with white spots, though in many species they lose these spots by

16375-529: The “beach” horizon at the lake margin. Species of fir , Douglas fir , spruce and pine were represented. The pollen collected includes species of sagebrush , spruce, pine, oak , Douglas fir, fir, juniper , as well as herbaceous and aquatic plants . Last Glacial Period The Last Glacial Period ( LGP ), also known as the Last glacial cycle , occurred from the end of the Last Interglacial to

16506-458: Was at its greatest extent between 23,500 and 21,000 years ago. This glaciation was somewhat distinct from the main Wisconsin glaciation, as it was only loosely related to the giant ice sheets and was instead composed of mountain glaciers, merging into the Cordilleran ice sheet. The Cordilleran ice sheet produced features such as glacial Lake Missoula , which broke free from its ice dam, causing

16637-513: Was identified at a Colorado laboratory in the 1960s and is believed to be a prion disease. Out of an abundance of caution hunters are advised to avoid contact with specified risk material (SRM) such as the brain, spinal column or lymph nodes. Deboning the meat when butchering and sanitizing the knives and other tools used to butcher are amongst other government recommendations. Deer are believed to have evolved from antlerless, tusked ancestors that resembled modern duikers and diminutive deer in

16768-461: Was more widespread. An ice sheet formed in New Zealand, covering all of the Southern Alps, where at least three glacial advances can be distinguished. Local ice caps existed in the highest mountains of the island of New Guinea , where temperatures were 5 to 6 °C colder than at present. The main areas of Papua New Guinea where glaciers developed during the LGP were the Central Cordillera ,

16899-501: Was not covered by a continental-scale ice sheet. Instead, large, but restricted, icefield complexes covered mountain ranges within northeast Siberia, including the Kamchatka-Koryak Mountains. The Arctic Ocean between the huge ice sheets of America and Eurasia was not frozen throughout, but like today, probably was covered only by relatively shallow ice, subject to seasonal changes and riddled with icebergs calving from

17030-474: Was once primarily tropical seasonal moist deciduous forest and wet savanna that hosted populations of hog deer, the now-extinct Schomburgk's deer , Eld's deer , Indian sambar, and Indian muntjac. Both the hog deer and Eld's deer are rare, whereas Indian sambar and Indian muntjac thrive in protected national parks, such as Khao Yai . Many of these South Asian and Southeast Asian deer species also share their habitat with other herbivores , such as Asian elephants ,

17161-493: Was subsequently used to reconstruct the paleoecosystem at ancient Lake Ziegler. A $ 10.5 million dam for the reservoir was scheduled to be completed by mid-October 2011, with the site was expected to be underwater by November 2011. For that reason, any paleontological excavation had to be done quickly. The excavations were led by the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, together with the U.S. Geological Survey and scientists from at least 19 institutions. The Snowmastodon Project, as

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