[mlhpdx]

What comes with people migrating to new environments? New diseases.

It’s bizarre to me that hunting is the “regular suspect” in so many imaginations of the far past when the diseases transported by humans and their animals was almost certainly as substantial a factor in the far past as it was more recently.

[EdwardDiego]

Actually was thinking on this, I suspect you're right that this is another potential stressor that should be considered.

Not so much diseases from animals brought by humans, but rather diseases/parasites from related animals who just mosied onto and sometimes over Beringia of their own accord.

E.g., wooly mammoths on the Eurasian steppes and American mastodons spent a lot of time developing in isolation, they could've had their own diseases they'd evolved to resist, then Beringia arises from the seas, and 100 years later, a mastodon catches the Mammmoth-flu or something.

From what little I understand, some of the N. American megafauna have been shown to have limited genetic diversity due to small founder populations, which we know can increase the vulnerability of a population to a novel disease.

I'm wondering how you'd be able to prove or disprove this though, maybe coprolites? Googling this briefly turned up this amazing website with the even more amazing tagline "#1 for fossilized #2"...

https://poozeum.com/

Brb doing a PhD in paleoepizootiology.

[varenc]

I don't believe there's any clear evidence for this theory, though that doesn't mean anything. Die offs from disease don't really leave anything in the fossil record. But it's hard to favor a hypothetical explanation when there's other theories with at least some data supporting them around.

[EdwardDiego]

Interesting point, what evidence is there of zoonotic vectors though?

[throwuwu]

Which domesticated animals would those be in north and South America?

[mlhpdx]

Domesticated? Human beings back then would have been a walking menagerie of pests, right? Seeds and plant matter, mice, mites, flees, pets, and yes if they managed to travel with livestock, them too.

All of which we know today are vectors for the spread of disease.

I have zero expertise to comment on what a primary contributor to population declines might’ve been for any given animal, I just find it fascinating (and baffling) that those who are experts seemingly ignore something that is undoubtedly a contributing factor.

As others point out this is of course understandable, because the story is less compelling. The image of humans with spears tracking down the last wild beast is one imaginations can’t resist. The image of slowly dying and decaying beasts, less so.

[throwuwu]

Might as well blame any other animal then

[JackFr]

Wouldn’t that work in both directions though?