Ecological responses to land use change in the face of European colonization of Haytí island

Castilla‐Beltrán, Alvaro; Hooghiemstra, H.; Hoogland, Menno L. P.; Donders, Timme H.; Jiménez, Jaime; McMichael, Crystal N.H.; Rolefes, Steven Marinus Francisco; Olijhoek, Thomas; Malatesta, Eduardo Herrera; Hung, Jorge Ulloa; Hofman, Corinne L.

doi:10.1016/j.quascirev.2020.106407

Cited by 13 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 36 publications

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“…Interestingly, forest cover shows a strong negative correlation with time since first human arrival, corroborating a pattern of land-use transformation documented in archaeological studies [74]. Nevertheless, present-day forest cover or its recent loss dynamics may have little relationship to regional land-use changes or human population densities that affected biodiversity in past centuries or millennia [75,76].…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 72%

Where the wild things were: intrinsic and extrinsic extinction predictors in the world's most depleted mammal fauna

et al. 2021

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Preventing extinctions requires understanding macroecological patterns of vulnerability or persistence. However, correlates of risk can be nonlinear, within-species risk varies geographically, and current-day threats cannot reveal drivers of past losses. We investigated factors that regulated survival or extinction in Caribbean mammals, which have experienced the globally highest level of human-caused postglacial mammalian extinctions, and included all extinct and extant Holocene island populations of non-volant species (219 survivals or extinctions across 118 islands). Extinction selectivity shows a statistically detectable and complex body mass effect, with survival probability decreasing for both mass extremes, indicating that intermediate-sized species have been more resilient. A strong interaction between mass and age of first human arrival provides quantitative evidence of larger mammals going extinct on the earliest islands colonized, revealing an extinction filter caused by past human activities. Survival probability increases on islands with lower mean elevation (mostly small cays acting as offshore refugia) and decreases with more frequent hurricanes, highlighting the risk of extreme weather events and rising sea levels to surviving species on low-lying cays. These findings demonstrate the interplay between intrinsic biology, regional ecology and specific local threats, providing insights for understanding drivers of biodiversity loss across island systems and fragmented habitats worldwide.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 72%

Where the wild things were: intrinsic and extrinsic extinction predictors in the world's most depleted mammal fauna

et al. 2021

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“…El Flaco and El Carril are located within viewshed of one another and are nestled in the southern foothills of the Cordillera Septentrional overlooking the agriculturally productive Cibao Valley. The inhabitants of El Flaco and El Carril likely had stronger reliance on terrestrial animals according to zooarchaeological studies (Shev, Ali, et al, 2021 ) and were situated within an agriculturally productive region overlooking the fertile Cibao Valley from which sediment cores provide ample evidence for anthropogenic fire usage (Castilla‐Beltrán et al, 2018 , 2020 ; Hooghiemstra et al, 2018 ). It is possible that horticultural practices attracted hutias to the site and may indicate that this species was synanthropic with their predation by humans mostly reflecting garden hunting practices.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Paleodietary reconstruction of endemic rodents from the precolumbian Dominican Republic: Discriminating wild feeding behavior from diets linked to human niche construction activities

Shev

Laffoon

2022

Intl J of Osteoarchaeology

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In the Greater Antilles, certain animal taxa that have long been theorized to have been managed by indigenous peoples prior to AD1492, the main candidates being a group of endemic caviomorph rodents known as hutias (Capromyinae). This isotopic study investigates the paleodiets of several species of endemic rodents from three late precolonial sites in the northern Dominican Republic: El Flaco (cal. AD 990-1452), El Carril (cal. AD 1030-1262), and La Entrada (cal. AD 840-900) to assess whether human influence over animal diets can be determined. We examined bone collagen carbon (δ 13 C co ) and nitrogen (δ 15 N) and tooth enamel carbon (δ 13 C en ) isotope values of three species of hutias, Isolobodon portoricensis, Isolobodon montanus, and Plagiodontia aedium, alongside edible rat (Brotomys sp.), and domestic guinea pig (Cavia porcellus). To estimate dietary source contributions, we employed a Bayesian dietary mixing model (FRUITS v.3.0) and ran three different permutations to assess the relative contributions of C 3 or C 4 /CAM plants. The addition of an extra 79 wild C 3 and 40 wild C 4 /CAM plant species' isotope values from published sources to an established isotopic foodweb for the Caribbean region enabled us to discriminate between wild and domestic C 3 and C 4 /CAM plant food sources in two of these models. Our results provide evidence of the significant consumption of domestic C 4 /CAM plants by some animals. This likely represents maize (Zea mays) consumption, which is known to have been ubiquitously cultivated by indigenous peoples in the region. This is particularly the case for I. portoricensis, as FRUITS modeling suggests that a few individuals consumed C 4 /CAM plants well beyond their expected natural diets as determined from feeding studies of extant hutia species. This may indicate human influence over endemic rodent diets due to niche construction activities such as horticultural practices and may reflect either opportunistic feeding on human produce or the purposeful supplementation of hutia diets by humans.

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“…Such mounds could reach up to three meters in height and twelve meters in diameter, and in some cases also served as burial locations (Pagán-Jiménez et al, 2020;van Dijk, 2019;Sonnemann, Ulloa Hung and Hofman, 2016;Hofman and Hoogland, 2015). Furthermore, we were able to perform palaeoecological analysis at two of the excavated sites, as well as at key places along one of the major rivers, the Yaque, that has provided fundamental information about the human impact on the surrounding environment (Castilla-Beltrán et al, 2018;Castilla-Beltrán et al, 2020). The recent identification of some of the crops that were cultivated on the mounds and/or eaten by the Indigenous people on the site further contextualized this environmental setting (Pagán-Jiménez et al, 2020).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Looking at the Big Picture: Using Spatial Statistical Analyses to Study Indigenous Settlement Patterns in the North-Western Dominican Republic

Malatesta

Hung

Hofman

2023

Journal of Computer Applications in Archaeology

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After several field campaigns between 2007 and 2018 in the northwestern region of the Dominican Republic, more than 300 archaeological sites have been registered and revisited. While several of these sites were identified through the scatter of surface material culture, others show terrain modifications in the form of anthropogenic mounds and levelled areas. Researchers have gathered valuable information regarding these features' functionality and construction processes through large-scale excavations in archaeological sites with anthropogenic mounds, paleoenvironmental studies and remote sensing analyses. These anthropogenic mounds represent a long-term process of formation and were used for a variety of purposes ranging from agricultural to ritual activities. While excavations and small-scale remote sensing can provide a myriad of data to improve our understanding of these archaeological sites, a regional perspective is needed to map the relationship among archaeological sites with and without terrain modifications, to better understand the Indigenous cultural patterns in their regional environment. In this regard, the primary objective of this paper is to explore to what extent these archaeological sites were related to the environment and each other. This was achieved by correlating archaeological data with a set of archaeologically recognized important environmental variables using advanced spatial statistics. The results provide important insights to understand the underlying pattern of archaeological sites in this region and its relationship with the environmental setting.

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Ecological responses to land use change in the face of European colonization of Haytí island

Cited by 13 publications

References 36 publications

Where the wild things were: intrinsic and extrinsic extinction predictors in the world's most depleted mammal fauna

Where the wild things were: intrinsic and extrinsic extinction predictors in the world's most depleted mammal fauna

Paleodietary reconstruction of endemic rodents from the precolumbian Dominican Republic: Discriminating wild feeding behavior from diets linked to human niche construction activities

Looking at the Big Picture: Using Spatial Statistical Analyses to Study Indigenous Settlement Patterns in the North-Western Dominican Republic

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