Irish elkThe Irish elk (Megaloceros giganteus), also called the giant deer or Irish deer, is an extinct species of deer in the genus Megaloceros and is one of the largest deer that ever lived. Its range extended across Eurasia during the Pleistocene, from Ireland to Lake Baikal in Siberia. The most recent remains of the species have been radiocarbon dated to about 7,700 years ago in western Russia. The Irish elk is known from abundant skeletal remains which have been found in bogs in Ireland.
GlossotheriumGlossotherium is an extinct genus of large mylodontid ground sloths of the subfamily Mylodontinae. It represents one of the best-known members of the family, along with Mylodon and Paramylodon. Reconstructed animals were between long and possibly weighed up to 1700 kg. The majority of finds of Glossotherium date from the Middle and Upper Pleistocene, around 300,000 to 10,000 years ago, with a few dating older, as far back Pliocene, about 3.3-3 million years ago.
Saiga antelopeThe saiga antelope (ˈsaɪɡə, Saiga tatarica), or saiga, is an antelope which is critically endangered, and during antiquity inhabited a vast area of the Eurasian steppe, spanning the foothills of the Carpathian Mountains in the northwest and Caucasus in the southwest, into Mongolia in the northeast and Dzungaria in the southeast. During the Pleistocene, they ranged across the mammoth steppe from the British Isles to Beringian North America. Today, the dominant subspecies (S. t.
BlancanThe Blancan North American Stage on the geologic timescale is the North American faunal stage according to the North American Land Mammal Ages chronology (NALMA), typically set from 4,750,000 to 1,806,000 years BP, a period of . It is usually considered to start in the early-mid Pliocene Epoch and end by the early Pleistocene. The Blancan is preceded by the Hemphillian and followed by the Irvingtonian NALMA stages. As usually defined, it corresponds to the mid-Zanclean through Piacenzian and Gelasian stages in Europe and Asia.
Homo rhodesiensisHomo rhodesiensis is the species name proposed by Arthur Smith Woodward (1921) to classify Kabwe 1 (the "Kabwe skull" or "Broken Hill skull", also "Rhodesian Man"), a Middle Stone Age fossil recovered from Broken Hill mine in Kabwe, Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia). In 2020, the skull was dated to 324,000 to 274,000 years ago. Other similar older specimens also exist. H. rhodesiensis is now widely considered a synonym of H. heidelbergensis. Other designations such as Homo sapiens arcaicus and Homo sapiens rhodesiensis have also been proposed.
Fire-stick farmingFire-stick farming, also known as cultural burning and cool burning, is the practice of Aboriginal Australians regularly using fire to burn vegetation, which has been practised for thousands of years. There are a number of purposes for doing this special type of controlled burning, including to facilitate hunting, to change the composition of plant and animal species in an area, weed control, hazard reduction, and increase of biodiversity.
ProcoptodonProcoptodon is an extinct genus of giant short-faced (sthenurine) kangaroos that lived in Australia during the Pleistocene Epoch. P. goliah, the largest known kangaroo species that ever existed, stood at about . They weighed about . Other members of the genus were smaller, however; Procoptodon gilli was the smallest of all of the sthenurine kangaroos, standing approximately tall. The genus is derived from Simosthenurus, making the latter genus paraphyletic.
Oxygen isotope ratio cycleOxygen isotope ratio cycles are cyclical variations in the ratio of the abundance of oxygen with an atomic mass of 18 to the abundance of oxygen with an atomic mass of 16 present in some substances, such as polar ice or calcite in ocean core samples, measured with the isotope fractionation. The ratio is linked to ancient ocean temperature which in turn reflects ancient climate. Cycles in the ratio mirror climate changes in the geological history of Earth.
Mount KenyaMount Kenya (Kikuyu: Kĩrĩnyaga, Kamba, Ki Nyaa) is an extinct stratovolcano in Kenya and the second-highest peak in Africa, after Kilimanjaro. The highest peaks of the mountain are Batian (), Nelion () and Point Lenana (). Mount Kenya is located in the former Eastern and Central provinces of Kenya; its peak is now the intersection of Meru, Embu, Kirinyaga, Nyeri and Tharaka Nithi counties, about south of the equator, around north-northeast of the capital Nairobi. Mount Kenya is the source of the name of the Republic of Kenya.
PeriglaciationPeriglaciation (adjective: "periglacial", referring to places at the edges of glacial areas) describes geomorphic processes that result from seasonal thawing and freezing, very often in areas of permafrost. The meltwater may refreeze in ice wedges and other structures. "Periglacial" originally suggested an environment located on the margin of past glaciers. However, freeze and thaw cycles influence landscapes also outside areas of past glaciation. Therefore, periglacial environments are anywhere when freezing and thawing modify the landscape in a significant manner.
