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Fossil Coleoptera from the Pilauco Site: An Approach to Late Pleistocene Microenvironments

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Pilauco: A Late Pleistocene Archaeo-paleontological Site

Part of the book series: The Latin American Studies Book Series ((LASBS))

Abstract

Quaternary fossil beetles have been widely used as environmental indicators and reconstructions of past climate. In Chile, records of fossil Coleoptera range from ~28,000 to 5200 cal yr BP with the higher concentration of fossil sites in Patagonia. This chapter presents an overview of the aforementioned studies, with an emphasis on the taxonomic beetle composition and some environmental inferences of the Pilauco site. In Pilauco, 13 families and 21 species of fossil beetles have been described with age constraints ranging between 15,750 and 14,700 cal yr BP. Enochrus vicinus and Germainiellus dentipennis are the most abundant species at Pilauco. Based on the record of Coleoptera, was possible infer that the surrounding vegetation around Pilauco was dominated by forest of Nothofagus sp., grasslands and wetlands. Beetle assemblages also provide information regarding the relationship between megafauna and coleopterans. This is mainly because; large herbivorous mammals may have provided substrates for the subsistence of dung beetles and scavengers, acting at the same time as modifiers of the site conditions and promoting greater environmental heterogeneity. These results highlight the need to incorporate modern information of intraspecific species dynamics and disturbances to studies of environmental and climatic paleo reconstructions based on fossil beetles.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Information obtained from the National Museum of Natural History.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Facultad de Ciencias Forestales y Recursos Naturales, Programa de Doctorado en Ecosistemas Forestales y Recursos Naturales, Universidad Austral de Chile, Valdivia, Chile

    Francisco Tello

  2. Center for Climate and Resilience Research “CR2”, FONDAP, CONICYT, Santiago, Chile

    Francisco Tello

  3. Transdisciplinary Center for Quaternary Research “TAQUACH”, Valdivia, Chile

    Francisco Tello & Fernanda Torres

Authors
  1. Francisco Tello
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  2. Fernanda Torres
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Correspondence to Francisco Tello .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Facultad de Ciencias, Instituto de Ciencias de la Tierra, Universidad Austral de Chile, Valdivia, Chile

    Mario Pino

  2. Facultad de Ciencias, Instituto de Ciencias de la Tierra, Universidad Austral de Chile, Valdivia, Chile

    Giselle A. Astorga

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Tello, F., Torres, F. (2020). Fossil Coleoptera from the Pilauco Site: An Approach to Late Pleistocene Microenvironments. In: Pino , M., Astorga, G. (eds) Pilauco: A Late Pleistocene Archaeo-paleontological Site. The Latin American Studies Book Series. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-23918-3_12

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