Dwindling Wild Goats

I managed to spend an hour or so at the Racine Zoo today, so:

West Caucasian Tur (Capra caucasica), Racine Zoo, Racine Co, WI 3/21/2014

This is a West Caucasian Tur (Capra caucasica) -- a species I had never photographed before, which is always neat. It's considered to be endemic to the western Caucasus Mountains of Georgia and Russia, an area that boasts of 5 species of sheep and goats, more than any other on Earth.

They're listed as Endangered, with a 50% decline in population over the last 3 decades, largely due to excess hunting pressures. (1) (Some authors consider this to be the same species as the East Caucasian Tur (C. cylindricornis), which is only considered Near Threatened.) (2)

Humans (and their cousins) have been hunting these guys for a long time -- Mousterian archaeological sites frequently include Tur remains. (These would have been Neandertals.) But back then, we were doing so not only in the Caucasus region, (3, 4) but throughout Western Europe. (5,6, 7) This does make me wonder about the word endemic -- apparently as it's used here, it refers strictly to a species range during historic times. So there's two ways to become an endemic: evolve in one spot and remain there (Hawaiian Honeycreepers, for example), or experience a severe population drop and range restriction before anyone's bothering to pay attention.

The Mousterian falls during the last glacial period, so the environment around them has obviously changed, and it's probably impossible to determine how much human hunting had to do with their current absence from most of Europe. We do know that whenever modern humans have reached new areas, large animals have disappeared. This usually happened so long ago that the reasons are consistently controversial, though, and it's possible that we've repeatedly been innocent bystanders. But the recent declines are clearly the result of human activity, an all too common refrain, and one that grows more difficult to change as each year goes by.

I can't ask the Turs themselves, obviously, but it does look like this guy has his own opinions on the topic:

West Caucasian Tur (Capra caucasica), Racine Zoo, Racine Co, WI 3/21/2014

(1) Weinberg, P. 2008. Capra caucasica. In: IUCN 2013. IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2013.2. <www.iucnredlist.org>. Downloaded on 22 March 2014.

(2) Weinberg, P. 2008. Capra cylindricornis. In: IUCN 2013. IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2013.2. <www.iucnredlist.org>. Downloaded on 22 March 2014.

(3) Bar‐Oz, G., Belfer‐Cohen, A., Meshveliani, T., Djakeli, N., & Bar‐Yosef, O. (2008). Taphonomy and zooarchaeology of the Upper Palaeolithic cave of Dzudzuana, Republic of Georgia. International Journal of Osteoarchaeology,18(2), 131-151.

(4) Hidjrati, N. I., Kimball, L. R., & Koetje, T. (2003). Middle and Late Pleistocene investigations of Myshtulagty Lagat (Weasel Cave) North Ossetia, Russia.Antiquity, 77(298), 1-5.

(5) Rivals, F., Schulz, E., & Kaiser, T. M. (2009). Late and middle Pleistocene ungulates dietary diversity in Western Europe indicate variations of Neanderthal paleoenvironments through time and space. Quaternary Science Reviews,28(27), 3388-3400.

(6) Rivals, F., & Deniaux, B. (2005). Investigation of human hunting seasonality through dental microwear analysis of two Caprinae in late Pleistocene localities in Southern France. Journal of archaeological science, 32(11), 1603-1612.

(7) Valensi, P., Crégut-Bonnoure, E., & Defleur, A. (2012). Archaeozoological data from the Mousterian level from Moula-Guercy (Ardèche, France) bearing cannibalised Neanderthal remains. Quaternary International, 252, 48-55.