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Estimation of Body Size in Fossil Mammals

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Methods in Paleoecology

Part of the book series: Vertebrate Paleobiology and Paleoanthropology ((VERT))

Abstract

Body mass is a fundamental ecological parameter of mammals with implications for a variety of other ecological characteristics. While it cannot be directly measured in fossil taxa, it can be inferred using allometric relationships between skeletal dimensions and mass derived from extant species. Many such relationships have been described, primarily for dental and limb dimensions. Methods of statistical analysis vary widely, however, in ways with substantial implications for the inferred masses of fossil species. The subset of extant species from which the relationship is derived must be representative of the evolutionary and ecological scope of the fossil taxa for which mass is to be estimated. Increasing computing power and an explosion of phylogenetic comparative methods offer the opportunity to gain an understanding of the processes driving these important empirical relationships.

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Acknowledgments

Thanks are due to Darin Croft, Scott Simpson and Denise Su for organizing the mammal paleoecology symposium that led to this volume, inspiring numerous exciting and productive conversations. I also owe thanks to Samantha Price for endless patience in teaching me phylogenetic comparative methods. Thanks to undergraduate and graduate students past and present for questioning assumptions, inspiring research, and actually getting science done. In particular, I will be ever grateful to John Orcutt for deep discussions of body size evolution in the course of his dissertation research. Finally, thanks to Edward Davis for years of discussion of body mass reconstruction, statistics of fossil samples, and regression analysis.

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  1. Department of Geological Sciences, Clark Honors College, 1293 University of Oregon, Eugene, OR, 97403-1293, USA

    Samantha S. B. Hopkins

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Correspondence to Samantha S. B. Hopkins .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Anatomy, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH, USA

    Darin A. Croft

  2. Department of Paleobotany and Paleoecology, Cleveland Museum of Natural History, Cleveland, OH, USA

    Denise F. Su

  3. Department of Anatomy, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH, USA

    Scott W. Simpson

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Hopkins, S.S.B. (2018). Estimation of Body Size in Fossil Mammals. In: Croft, D., Su, D., Simpson, S. (eds) Methods in Paleoecology. Vertebrate Paleobiology and Paleoanthropology. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-94265-0_2

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