Modelling the extinction of Steller's sea cow
Steller's sea cow, a giant sirenian discovered in 1741 and extinct by 1768, is one of the few megafaunal mammal species to have died out during the historical period. The species is traditionally considered to have been exterminated by ‘blitzkrieg’-style direct overharvesting for food, but it h...
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Online Access: | http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1617197 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17148336 https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2005.0415 |
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ftpubmed:oai:pubmedcentral.nih.gov:1617197 2023-05-15T15:42:30+02:00 Modelling the extinction of Steller's sea cow Turvey, S.T Risley, C.L 2005-12-19 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1617197 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17148336 https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2005.0415 en eng The Royal Society http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1617197 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17148336 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2005.0415 © 2005 The Royal Society Research Article Text 2005 ftpubmed https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2005.0415 2013-08-31T09:07:54Z Steller's sea cow, a giant sirenian discovered in 1741 and extinct by 1768, is one of the few megafaunal mammal species to have died out during the historical period. The species is traditionally considered to have been exterminated by ‘blitzkrieg’-style direct overharvesting for food, but it has also been proposed that its extinction resulted from a sea urchin population explosion triggered by extirpation of local sea otter populations that eliminated the shallow-water kelps on which sea cows fed. Hunting records from eighteenth century Russian expeditions to the Commander Islands, in conjunction with life-history data extrapolated from dugongs, permit modelling of sea cow extinction dynamics. Sea cows were massively and wastefully overexploited, being hunted at over seven times the sustainable limit, and suggesting that the initial Bering Island sea cow population must have been higher than suggested by previous researchers to allow the species to survive even until 1768. Environmental changes caused by sea otter declines are unlikely to have contributed to this extinction event. This indicates that megafaunal extinctions can be effected by small bands of hunters using pre-industrial technologies, and highlights the catastrophic impact of wastefulness when overexploiting resources mistakenly perceived as ‘infinite’. Text Bering Island Steller's sea cow PubMed Central (PMC) Biology Letters 2 1 94 97 |
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Research Article Turvey, S.T Risley, C.L Modelling the extinction of Steller's sea cow |
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Research Article |
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Steller's sea cow, a giant sirenian discovered in 1741 and extinct by 1768, is one of the few megafaunal mammal species to have died out during the historical period. The species is traditionally considered to have been exterminated by ‘blitzkrieg’-style direct overharvesting for food, but it has also been proposed that its extinction resulted from a sea urchin population explosion triggered by extirpation of local sea otter populations that eliminated the shallow-water kelps on which sea cows fed. Hunting records from eighteenth century Russian expeditions to the Commander Islands, in conjunction with life-history data extrapolated from dugongs, permit modelling of sea cow extinction dynamics. Sea cows were massively and wastefully overexploited, being hunted at over seven times the sustainable limit, and suggesting that the initial Bering Island sea cow population must have been higher than suggested by previous researchers to allow the species to survive even until 1768. Environmental changes caused by sea otter declines are unlikely to have contributed to this extinction event. This indicates that megafaunal extinctions can be effected by small bands of hunters using pre-industrial technologies, and highlights the catastrophic impact of wastefulness when overexploiting resources mistakenly perceived as ‘infinite’. |
format |
Text |
author |
Turvey, S.T Risley, C.L |
author_facet |
Turvey, S.T Risley, C.L |
author_sort |
Turvey, S.T |
title |
Modelling the extinction of Steller's sea cow |
title_short |
Modelling the extinction of Steller's sea cow |
title_full |
Modelling the extinction of Steller's sea cow |
title_fullStr |
Modelling the extinction of Steller's sea cow |
title_full_unstemmed |
Modelling the extinction of Steller's sea cow |
title_sort |
modelling the extinction of steller's sea cow |
publisher |
The Royal Society |
publishDate |
2005 |
url |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1617197 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17148336 https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2005.0415 |
genre |
Bering Island Steller's sea cow |
genre_facet |
Bering Island Steller's sea cow |
op_relation |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1617197 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17148336 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2005.0415 |
op_rights |
© 2005 The Royal Society |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2005.0415 |
container_title |
Biology Letters |
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2 |
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1 |
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94 |
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97 |
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1766376238048346112 |