Bison schoetensacki
Temporal range:
Fossil of Bison schoetensacki at the State Museum of Natural History Stuttgart
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Mammalia
Order: Artiodactyla
Family: Bovidae
Subfamily: Bovinae
Genus: Bison
Species:
†B. schoetensacki
Binomial name
†Bison schoetensacki
Freudenberg, 1910

Bison schoetensacki, commonly as the Pleistocene woodland bison or Pleistocene wood bison, was a species of bison that lived until from the Early Pleistocene to at least the early Middle Pleistocene from western Europe to southern Siberia.[1] Its presence in the Late Pleistocene is debated.[2]

Description

B. schoetensacki was generally similar to extant European bison in shape although there could have been morphological variations among European bisons during late Early Pleistocene and Early Holocene.[3]

In comparison to B. priscus, B. schoetensacki was either smaller or similar in size but with slenderer leg bones and metapodials, and had shorter and differently shaped horns.[4]

Diet

Despite its common name, B. schoetensacki was probably not a mix-feeder, like the extant American wood bison. Instead, dental mesowear of the species shows similar pattern to that of extant European bison, a grazer.[1]

Paleobiology

Fossils have been obtained from Czech Republic, England, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Moldova, Russia, Spain,[2][5] and mass excavations from the Paleolithic site of Isernia in Italy, dating back to around 700,000 years ago, indicate B. schoetensacki was the most heavily targeted animal by human hunters,[6] as European bison likely didn't inhabit the Italian and Iberian Peninsulas.[1]

Ranges of B. schoetensacki and steppe bison presumably overlapped for some extents.[1]

Genetics

A 2017 study which attributed Late Pleistocene European remains to B. schoetensacki found it to belong to a mitochondrial clade which is the sister group to modern wisent, and proposed the species as a whole is likely ancestral to modern wisent.[7][2] However, other studies have disputed this attribution, restricting B. schoetensacki to Early and Middle Pleistocene remains.[8]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Roman Uchytel. "Pleistocene woodland bison". Prehistoric-Fauna.com. Retrieved 2021-10-11.
  2. 1 2 3 Palacio, Pauline; Berthonaud, Véronique; Guérin, Claude; Lambourdière, Josie; Maksud, Frédéric; Philippe, Michel; Plaire, Delphine; Stafford, Thomas; Marsolier-Kergoat, Marie-Claude; Elalouf, Jean-Marc (2017-02-10). "Genome data on the extinct Bison schoetensacki establish it as a sister species of the extant European bison (Bison bonasus)". BMC Evolutionary Biology. 17 (1): 48. doi:10.1186/s12862-017-0894-2. ISSN 1471-2148. PMC 5303235. PMID 28187706.
  3. ↑ Leonardo Sorbelli, Marco Cherin, David M. Alba, Joan Madurell Malapeira, 2021, A review on Bison schoetensacki and its closest relatives through the early-Middle Pleistocene transition: Insights from the Vallparadís Section (NE Iberian Peninsula) and other European localities, edited by Danielle Schreve, Quaternary Science Reviews, Volume 261, DOI:106933, The Early-Middle Pleistocene Transition in Mediterranean Europe
  4. ↑ Marsolier-Kergoat, Marie Claude (2017). Evolutionary Biology: Self/Nonself Evolution, Species and Complex Traits Evolution, Methods and Concepts. Springer International Publishing. pp. 187–198. ISBN 9783319615691.
  5. ↑ Leonardo Sorbelli, Marco Cherin, David M. Alba, Joan Madurell Malapeira, 2019, The Epivillafranchian Bison schoetensacki sample from the Vallparadís Section, The Early-Middle Pleistocene Transition in Mediterranean Europe
  6. ↑ Thun Hohenstein, Ursula; Di Nucci, Annarosa; Moigne, Anne-Marie (January 2009). "Mode de vie à Isernia La Pineta (Molise, Italie). Stratégie d'exploitation du Bison schoetensacki par les groupes humains au Paléolithique inférieur". L'Anthropologie (in French). 113 (1): 96–110. doi:10.1016/j.anthro.2009.01.009.
  7. ↑ Marsolier-Kergoat, Marie-Claude; Elalouf, Jean-Marc (2017), Pontarotti, Pierre (ed.), "The Descent of Bison", Evolutionary Biology: Self/Nonself Evolution, Species and Complex Traits Evolution, Methods and Concepts, Cham: Springer International Publishing, pp. 187–198, doi:10.1007/978-3-319-61569-1_10, ISBN 978-3-319-61568-4, retrieved 2022-02-10
  8. ↑ Grange, Thierry; Brugal, Jean-Philip; Flori, Laurence; Gautier, Mathieu; Uzunidis, Antigone; Geigl, Eva-Maria (September 2018). "The Evolution and Population Diversity of Bison in Pleistocene and Holocene Eurasia: Sex Matters". Diversity. 10 (3): 65. doi:10.3390/d10030065.


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