I just looked at the link to the Arizona Daily Star that Steve had in his last post that had this great picture of Dr. Paul Martin holding a Pleistocene Ground Sloth – “coprolite” is the proper term – and thought it deserved a post of its own. Such a priceless picture! This is real …
Author: Reid Farmer
Life is Dangerous – Deal With It
The title Biting Back: just because great white sharks are protected doesn’t mean we should be on their menu of this LA Times op-ed almost says it all. It is symptomatic of the age we live in that an increasing proportion of our population believes that nature belongs in nature movies and we as individuals …
Pygmy Mammoths
A little known but interesting aspect of Pleistocene megafauna was the species of pygmy mammoth (Mammuthus exilis) that inhabited the Northern Channel Islands of the California Coast. During the late Pleistocene when sea level was much lower than it is now, the four present northern islands (San Miguel, Santa Rosa, Santa Cruz, and Anacapa) were …
Very Old Rock Art Blogging
In light of Steve’s post on Pleistocene Park and his suggestion that it start in Utah, I wanted to share this petroglyph of a mammoth from….Utah. This is the only North American rock art that I am familiar with that depicts extinct megafauna. The rock face where this image lies is in the Moab area. …
Rock Art Blogging
Last May my wife Connie and I were lucky enough to take part in a tour of archaeological sites at Vandenberg Air Force Base here in Santa Barbara County, California. The tour was set up by Santa Barbara County Archaeological Society and guided by Larry Spanne, Chief of Cultural Resources at VAFB and I want …
Prehistoric Passenger Pigeons – A Mystery
Over the weekend I picked up a copy of 1491 by Charles Mann. This is a fascinating book for those interested in New World archaeology and natural history. Its basic message is that the environment encountered by Europeans at initial contact was not an edenic natural paradise but was an anthropogenic construct. In other words, …
Prehistoric Contact Between Polynesia and California?
I want to thank Steve for extending the invitation to guest-blog here. I have been a great fan of his since reading Querencia in 1994. I make my living as a professional archaeologist and I was delighted to find we have common interests in that field upon discovering this blog last month. Our resulting fun …