Preliminary findings on the gastrointestinal parasites of the brown bear (Ursus arctos) in the Cantabrian mountains, Spain

Research Areas: Parasitology ; Veterinary SciencesABSTRACT - No study is currently available on the parasitofauna of the population of brown bears (Ursus arctos) inhabiting the Cantabrian Mountains in Spain. The aim of the present study was to obtain novel information on diversity and prevalence of gastrointestinal parasites in these individuals. During August 2016 and from May to July 2017, 14 fecal samples were collected from the western Cantabrian bear subpopulation, in the Somiedo Natural Park, in the Spanish province of Asturias. The prevalence of parasites detected was 71% and two genera were identified: Dicrocoelium sp. and Trichuris sp. Since the impact that pathogens such as endoparasites can have on the health of bears, together with other stressors, is still poorly understood, research efforts that include disease surveillance are critical to the successful protection of this emblematic species. Our preliminary findings require further investigations, with a wider sampling effort, and bring awareness for the need of carrying further studies on this area as a part of a proactive species management plan.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Reconstructing the sedimentary history of Lezetxiki II cave (Basque Country, northern Iberian Peninsula) using micromorphological analysis

Micromorphological analysis is an invaluable research tool for reconstructing detailed depositional and post-depositional processes of cave infill sequences and for providing paleoenvironmental insight. In this work, we present the results of a micromorphological and mineralogical study of the sedimentary sequence at the Lezetxiki II cave (northern Iberian Peninsula). The cave forms part of the Lezetxiki archaeological complex which has yielded early Middle Palaeolithic tools and archaic human remains. We have identified three main clastic sedimentary processes as being significant at Lezetxiki II: 1) fluviokarst or runoff processes, which are characterised by yellow sandy illite-rich microfacies; 2) infiltration processes, which produce a massive red silty-clay vermiculite-rich microfacies; and 3) inwash processes, which generate a reworked illite and vermiculite rich silty sand microfacies. The most common post-depositional processes observed are calcite precipitation infilling pore spaces, and compression structures derived from specific vertical loading events. In order to improve the chronological framework of the sedimentary sequence at Lezetxiki II, we have revised previous radiometric and relative dating results from faunal and archaeological remains and have dated the lowermost stratigraphic level using single-grain thermally-transferred optically-stimulated luminescence dating. Sedimentation at the Lezetxiki II cave started during Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 7 through fluviokarst processes. We interpreted that runoff prevailed during MIS 6, while soil infiltration processes became more significant towards the MIS 5 optimum. Gradually, inwash processes prevailed over infiltration until the end of the interglacial phase. During the following glacial phases, runoff and erosion dominated but were subsequently replaced by inwash processes during MIS 1.PALEOGATE project, funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (HAR2014-53536-P) as well as the US14/16 project funded by the University of the Basque Country and Basque Coast Geopark, and Basque Government (IT1029-16-GBV6). We would also like to thank Tim Nicholson for his work in translating and editing different versions of the English text. Additional financial support for this research was provided by Australian Research Council (ARC) Future Fellowship project FT130100195, ARC Discovery Early Career Researcher Award DE16010074

Bears among people

Bears living in a human-dominated landscape need to find a way to co-exist with people on a daily basis. People seriously alter their environment. Urbanization, agriculture, and road infrastructure actively change the natural environment of many wildlife species. Interestingly, especially omnivores and generalist species such as bears can even have a profit of habitat alternation mainly through adding of so-called “predictable anthropogenic food resources” (PAFS). These human-provided food resources are not only garbage or supplementary feeding stations, but also orchards or single fruit trees, agricultural crops, entrails left by hunters in the wood, and livestock animals. Bears can adapt to the availability of these foods and try to actively search for them. On the other hand in a human dominated landscape, animals are constantly disturbed by people. Many bears in cultural landscapes tend to be active during crepuscular or night-time hours in order to avoid people who are rather active during the day. Therefore, the relationship between Man and bear can be defined as ambivalent because the animals need to trade-off between feeding on PAFS and avoiding of human disturbance. Bears in Slovakia had never been extinct and increased their population numbers during the last decades. However, till I started this work, scientific research of bears was nearly absent. By the help of smaller project, it was possible to catch bears and mark them by GPS/GSM telemetry. For this study, I could use the data of 22 bears in three different mountain ranges. My main interests were 1) to find out how important human-provided food resources for bears in Slovakia are and if bears are really dependent on supplementary feeding stations during winter time. I found out that bears indeed feed year round on cereals, but that the majority of their energy budget is provided by natural food resources. However, maize fields are an important new and temporal habitat feature where some bears even stay for several consecutive day. Exceptional activity of bears during winter months was rather triggered by a combination of warmer temperatures, less snow and seed years of beech nuts than just the availability of high caloric food at supplementary feeding stations for ungulates. Second I wanted to know where bears can successfully retreat of human disturbance during the day and if the availability of PAFS can even influence the selection of a daybed. Most important driver for the selection of a daily resting site was the density of cover. Thus, bears selected for young regenerating forest, but also forest belts and thick shrubbery interspersed in agricultural land. This selection pattern was even more pronounced during late summer/autumn when bears need to fatten up for the upcoming winter and crops and fruits become available at the same time. Social structure (dispotic organization of the bear population) in bears as well as the reproductive status of females can significantly influence the choice of a daybed. Females with cubs of the year stay away from the other bear groups in order to minimize the risk of infanticide. These females and sub-dominant males can even approach human settlement in order to protect themselves or their offspring from dominant males. Further, habitat selection analysis showed that especially dominant males tend to monopolize attractive fields with maize. Sometimes, sub-dominant individuals even use people as a human shield. These results showed that non-protected areas could even need more protection because they are often very useful for wildlife including bears. Subsidies are paid for the reclamation of overgrown grazing areas which includes cutting of shrubs and small forest stands. Bears visible near villages are not necessary dangerous and often temporally restricted. Bear management should take this results more into account. However, people feel threatened if they have bears in close vicinity to their houses. Thus, education of people and working with public should be enhanced, too. Third, bears need to move among patches with attractive foods and quiet refuges during the day. In a human dominated landscape, roads intersect wildlife habitat and bears need to undertake risky road crossings. Analysis of road crossing activity of the bears in Slovakia showed that especially the amount of daily traffic can seriously limit or even inhibit bear movements. Even secondary roads with more than 5 000 vehicles/24hrs can act as a habitat barrier. Further, analysis if road mortality pointed out that majority of killed bears are young males which are the dispersing element of the population and enhance genetic exchange among sub-populations. A scientifically based analysis of bear movement routes can help to define places where mitigation measures would be really useful. Slovakia is still in process to enhance their road infrastructure. So far, Slovakia has still prospective possibilities to influence road planning processes in order to keep the landscape permeable for bears and other wildlife. Studies on movement routes should be intensified in order to avoid irreversible habitat fragmentation and disruption of bear subpopulations

Late Neanderthal subsistence strategies and cultural traditions in the northern Iberia Peninsula: Insights from Prado Vargas, Burgos, Spain

In order to better understand the causes and geographic patterns of Neanderthal demise it is necessary to broaden the focus of existing Neanderthal studies to include new sites from understudied regions, particularly those containing multi-level fossil and lithic records, and to improve regional-scale Neanderthal extinction frameworks using multiple dating techniques. To this end, we present an interdisciplinary study of the stratigraphy, chronology, pollen, fauna, lithic technology and human remains of the last Neanderthal level (Level N4) of Prado Vargas – a cave in northern Iberia, whose geographic location and chronology are ideal for investigating possible socio-economic and climatic influences on Neanderthal decline. Level N4 has yielded a rich Late Mousterian palimpsest indicative of repeated seasonal occupations, as well as a deciduous Neanderthal tooth, confirming the presence of children at the site. A wide range of human activities are detected in Level 4, with subsistence strategies demonstrating knowledgeable exploitation of the natural environs around the area. The site provides evidence for a distinctive recycling economy, including bone retouchers, recycling of cores, and intense (re)use of raw materials, which may reflect recurrent occupations or the particular cultural traditions of a regional group. Level N4 is dated to between 54.7 and 39.8 thousand years ago (ka) according to our new OSL and radiocarbon study. The late Neanderthal inhabitants of Prado Vargas were cold-adapted, and may have already been living in small, separate groups with marked territories and cultural traditions prior to the arrival of Homo sapiens in the Iberia Peninsula.Consejería de Cultura y Turismo de la Junta de Castilla y León y Ayuntamiento Merindad de Sotoscueva. The C14 dating was funded by Fundación Palarq. The OSL dating research was funded by Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Early Career Researcher Award DE160100743 and ARC Future Fellowship project FT200100816 awarded to M. Demuro. Marta Santamaría is the beneficiary of a predoctoral grant from University of Burgos (UBU). Gala Gómez Merino did tasks of cleaning and conservation of the tooth. We are grateful to Fundación La Escuela (Cornejo), Asociación Naboki (Quisicedo), Casa del Parque del Monumento Natural de Ojo Guareña and Benigno Gómez Pereda

The silence of the layers: Archaeological site visibility in the Pleistocene-Holocene transition at the Ebro Basin

The Ebro Basin constitutes one of the most representative territories in SW Europe for the study of prehistoric societies during the Pleistocene-Holocene transition. The correlation of palaeoenvironmental and geomorphological proxies obtained from sedimentary records with chronologically well-constrained reference archaeological sites has allowed defining this time frame precisely, such that three main pilot areas haven been broadly depicted: the Alavese region, the Pre-Pyrenees and the Bajo Aragón. Overall, the human imprint in the Ebro Basin was rare during the Upper Palaeolithic, but more visible from the Upper Magdalenian (14500–13500 cal BP) to Neolithic times (up to 5500 cal BP). Local environmental resources were continuously managed by the prehistoric communities in the different areas of study. In fact, the Ebro Basin acted during those millennia as a whole, developing the same cultural trends, industrial techniques and settlement patterns in parallel throughout the territory. However, some gaps exist in the 14C frequency curve (SCDPD curve). This is partially related to prehistoric sites in particular lithologies and geological structures that could have partly been lost by erosional processes, especially during the Early Holocene. In addition, this gap also parallels the reconstructed climate trend for the Pre-Pyrenean and the Bajo Aragón areas, which are defined by high frequencies of xerophilous flora until ca. 9500 cal BP, suggesting that continental climate features could have hampered the presence of well-established human communities in inland regions. The interdisciplinary research (archaeology, geomorphology and palaeoclimatology) discussed in this paper offers clues to understand the existence of fills and gaps in the archaeological record of the Ebro Basin, and can be applied in other territories with similar geographic and climate patterns