Researchers at the University of Cincinnati have discovered that extinct dwarf hippos, which once roamed Madagascar, lived in forests instead of the open grasslands preferred by common hippos on mainland Africa.
These findings suggest that the grasslands currently covering much of the enormous island off the eastern coast of southern Africa are a relatively recent change facilitated by humans, rather than a natural habitat sustained in part by these famously large vegetarians.
The study was published in the journal Plants, People, Planet.
When Madagascar separated from Africa’s mainland 150 million years ago, its plants and animals evolved in isolation in the Indian Ocean. Unlike the mainland, Madagascar did not have elephants, giraffes, rhinos, or other large mammals found today. However, it did have hippos.
2023-07-09 21:24:04
Original from phys.org
