Well there's a lot of debate as to what actually took out the larger animals. There's climate change, but Smilodon fatalis had been around for 1.5 million years at that point. It had already gone through several glacial/interglacial cycles as had most of the megafauna. Yeah the California plains dried out, but it wasn't the first time. What the heck was it that bumped them off the last time?
People probably. People come into an area and the first thing that happens is that most of the big species go extinct. You see this in Europe, Australia, South America, North America, and Africa to an extent.
So as it got warmer and the plants shifted, the larger animals were under pressure. People put added pressure on them, and they died off. Since Smilodon was so specialized - really, when the heck else is it going to eat with teeth like that but the large animals? - it died as well. I don't think it was necessarily "living on the edge" the whole 1.5 million years it was around.
(no subject)
Date: 10/31/08 12:41 am (UTC)People probably. People come into an area and the first thing that happens is that most of the big species go extinct. You see this in Europe, Australia, South America, North America, and Africa to an extent.
So as it got warmer and the plants shifted, the larger animals were under pressure. People put added pressure on them, and they died off. Since Smilodon was so specialized - really, when the heck else is it going to eat with teeth like that but the large animals? - it died as well. I don't think it was necessarily "living on the edge" the whole 1.5 million years it was around.