Corridors to Extinction and the Australian Megafauna

About this book

Extinctions have always occurred and always will, so what is so surprising about the megafauna extinctions? They were caused by humans and were the first of many extinctions that eventually led to the extinction of the Moa, Steller's Sea Cow, the Dodo, Great Auk and countless other species great and small, all attributed to human agency. Therefore, the megafauna were humans' first great impact on the planet. There is now an increasing realization that the 'blitzkrieg' view of these extinctions may have been wrong. A growing body of evidence and long-term field work is beginning to show that at least Australia's megafauna did not succumb to human agency, not because humans probably did not hunt the odd animal but because the an infinitely more logical reason lies in the climatic conditions of the Quaternary Ice Ages and the affect they had on continental geography, environment, climate and, most importantly, the biogeography of the megafauna. Corridors to Extinction and the Australian Megafauna presents the evidence of this theory, demonstrating the biogeographic approach to Australia's megafauna extinction.

Contents

Chapter  1 Extinction
Chapter  2 Extinction Drivers
Chapter  3 After the Dinosaurs
Chapter  4 Dreamtime to Desert
Chapter  5 The Australian Tertiary and the first marsupial extinctions
Chapter  6 Australia and the Ice Ages
Chapter  7 Who and Where: the Australian Megafauna and their distribution
Chapter  8 Australia's Megafauna Extinction Drivers
Chapter  9 Megafauna in the Southern Lake Eyre Basin: a case study
Chapter 10 Megafauna and Humans in Australia and Southeast Asia

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