SBER Instrumentation: Vehicle to be used in Anthropological Field Research on the Giant Extinct Lemurs and Associated Fauna of Madagascar

Duke University, Durham NC

Investigators

Abstract

Simons 0083774 The objective of the research project proposed here is to gather new collections of primate and other vertebrate subfossils in Madagascar from caves in limestone karst regions and from swamp deposits at a variety of sites. Efforts are focused on a series of caves in the Mahafaly Karsts near Toliara (Tulear). We will explore new sites in the western Bemaraha Massif and the northern Narinda Peninsula. We will also return to the productive Ankarana Massif of northern Madagascar and to the marsh sites of Ampasambazimba and the recently rediscovered Masinandraina. This research program has continued for several years, more recently funded by NSF BNS 89-11315, BNS 92-07084 and 96-30350. Earlier we found the most complete skeletons known for almost all giant extinct lemurs, and many new lines of investigation have opened up based on these associated finds. The cooperation involves scientists from five or more Universities. Roads in the regions we need to reach in order to make discoveries are awful or nearly nonexistent. There is terrific wear and tear on the vehicles and several we previously had have ceased to function. Hence, this proposal. Recent years have seen an explosion of interest in the attempt to understand the interaction in Madagascar between colonizing humans and the endemic species they met, as well as in documenting the role of environmental change in the extinction process. We have learned a great deal about paleodistributions of both extinct and living lemurs, and we have documented hithertofore unrecognized corridors and exchanges of fauna from different regions of the island. We are now beginning to understand the similarities and differences between modern and paleo- communities of the recent past, and we hope to document further, and in greater detail, the nature or "rules" (if any) and temporal framework of this continuing extinction event. To do so, we plan to gather new dates for subfossils, to search for better evidence of the contemporaneity of humans and giant lemurs, to focus on the systematics and ecogeographic variation of the subfossUs, and to test and modify if necessary our recent reconstructions of "ecospace" via ecomorphology. Controversy persists as to the probable agency for primate extinction in Madagascar: whether by disease, environmental change, human hands, or by their synergistic interaction. Additional island-wide radiocarbon dates are needed to establish the temporal length of the wave of extinction and better document the timing of environmental change. The very real possibility exists that different regions of Madagascar experienced a different combination of insults, and the extinction process was piecemeal and regionally distinct. Analysis of the associated fauna, particularly birds and small mammals, will provide new evidence about environmental change in particulhr regions and allow us to assess the nature and time depth of regional endemicity. Discoveries made to date from this project have revolutionized our understanding of essentially all known types of giant extinct lemurs and have added a few new species to the still growing roster of Malagasy primate taxa. We hope that new exploration planned here in the Bemaraha and Tulear regions will expand our knowledge of the rarest species such as Hadropithecus and the giant aye-aye or may lead to the discovery of new forms. We hope that the efficacy of our team working under previous grants has been demonstrated by the many finds and recent publications listed below. The present proposal requests 80% funding for al00GX Toyota 1999 model Landcruiser Station Wagon.