Pollen reveals the diet and environment of an extinct Pleistocene giant deer from the Netherlands

Abstract

Pollen analysis of five teeth (two premolars, three molars) from a single maxilla of a giant deer (Megaloceros giganteus) found in Pleistocene deposits in The Netherlands reflects the diet and the landscape of the specimen that lived in eastern Doggerland. Apiaceae (among which Anthriscus sylvestris, Heracleum and Hydrocotyle), Asteraceae (among which Anthemis-type, Senecio-type and Cichorioideae), Filipendula, Poaceae and Symphytum were among the ingested plants. The landscape had dense, species-rich tall-herb vegetation and an open tree layer of Alnus and Betula, whereas thermophilous tree taxa were absent. Climate was probably cool-temperate, semi-dry, sub-continental. A radiocarbon date of the maxilla is beyond the 14C detection limit. We conclude that our giant deer most likely lived during the early Eemian or during an early Weichselian interstadial.