Abstract
The paleoenvironment conditions that existed in the Late Pleistocene at the archaeological-paleontological site of El Arenoso, Sonora, NW Mexico, were inferred using the carbon and oxygen stable isotopes from one bison, one mammoth, and thirteen horses as well as the pedological characteristics and the carbon isotopes of calcium carbonates from paleosoil. The values δ13C of the bison (-1.4‰), the horses (-2.8‰), and the mammoth (-4.3‰) show that these animals fed mainly on C4 plants and carbon isotopic values from profile horizons of locality 4Bgk (-3.4‰), 3Ck (-3.4‰), and 2Bgk2 (-5.7‰) indicated the presence of C3/C4 vegetation mixed in El Arenoso. The oxygen isotopic ratios of the bison (-4.3‰), the horses (-2.6‰), and the mammoth (-5.1‰) show that these animals inhabited an arid environment, consistent with the results from the analyses of paleosols.
Highlights
Mexico was inhabited by various mammal species, especially of medium and large size, during the late Pleistocene, a geological epoch that ranges between 120,000 and 11,000 years before present (BP)
We report the results of carbon and oxygen isotopic analyses obtained from a series of samples of two horse (Equus sp.) molars, in addition to isotopic oxygen values obtained from bison (Bison sp.), horse, and mammoth (Mammuthus columbi) samples
El Arenoso includes a La Cantera profile, which Vidal Zepeda in which several archaeological materials have been found on the surface, while paleontological elements of Pleistocene fauna interstratified in the pedosedimentary profiles have been recorded in gullies associated with the margins of the El Segundo stream that runs to the southeast (Cruz-y-Cruz et al, 2018)
Summary
Mexico was inhabited by various mammal species, especially of medium and large size, during the late Pleistocene, a geological epoch that ranges between 120,000 and 11,000 years before present (BP). Some of these mammals became extinct near the Holocene (FerrusquiaVillafranca et al, 2010), which coincides with the arrival of the first humans to these lands (Lanata, 2011). Traces of human activity have been found in other areas of Mexico (Sánchez, 2001; Mirambell and Lorenzo, 2012; Stinnesbeck et al, 2017) One of these places is Sonora, a state that includes several localities with evidence of human presence during the late Pleistocene (Gaines and Sánchez, 2009; Gaines et al, 2009; Sánchez and Carpenter, 2016).
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