Late Pleistocene large-bodied mammalian fauna from Mocun cave in south China: Palaeontological, chronological and biogeographical implications

Abstract

This paper reports the discovery of a new mammalian assemblage at Mocun cave in 2000 by the Natural History Museum of Guangxi. The Mocun site is located in a residual karst peak in southwest Guangxi, south China. Abundant mammalian fossil teeth and bones were extracted from relatively thick deposits, well constrained stratigraphically. The results show that 1) the Mocun fauna is composed of typical species of the “Ailuropoda-Stegodon association”, including Stegodon, Ailuropoda, Rhinoceros, Pongo, Tapirus, Megatapirus, and Elephas, common in the Middle to the Late Pleistocene, with a larger portion of modern species; 2) By employing U-series dating (MC-ICP-MS) method on both the soda straw stalactites and mammalian teeth collected from deposits, the age of the Mocun fauna has been constrained between 66 and 101 ka, a transitional period from the interglacial stage MIS5 to the beginning of the last glacial stage (MIS4), representing one of the securely dated Late Pleistocene sites in southern China so far; 3) The composition in large mammals suggests a forested environment which harboured a great biodiversity in large species; 4) The taphonomic analysis indicates that the fossil accumulation is mainly due to activities of porcupines and to water flows; 5) Interestingly, our taxonomic study reveals some changes in the occurrence of Tapirus sinensis and Megatapirus augustus between ∼66 and ∼86 Ka, along with a change in the abundance of artiodactyls versus primates. It remains to demonstrate with more comprehensive records if these changes may be related to the mid-Late Pleistocene climatic transition.