Bison schoetensacki, commonly as the Pleistocene woodland bison or Pleistocene wood bison, was a species of bison that lived from the Early Pleistocene to at least the early Middle Pleistocene from western Europe to southern Siberia.[1] Its presence in the Late Pleistocene is debated.[2]
Description
B. schoetensacki was generally similar to extant European bison in shape although there could have been morphological variations among European bisons during late Early Pleistocene and Early Holocene.[3]
In comparison to B. priscus, B. schoetensacki was either smaller or similar in size but with slenderer leg bones and metapodials, and had shorter and differently shaped horns.[4]
Diet
Despite its common name, B. schoetensacki was probably not a mix-feeder, like the extant American wood bison. Instead, dental mesowear of the species shows similar pattern to that of extant European bison, a grazer.[1]
Paleobiology
During the Late Early and Early Middle Pleistocene, B. schoetensacki was the most common large bovid in Europe.[5] Fossils have been obtained from Czech Republic, England, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Moldova, Russia, Spain,[2][6] and mass excavations from the Paleolithic site of Isernia in Italy, dating back to around 700,000 years ago, indicate B. schoetensacki was the most heavily targeted animal by human hunters,[7] as European bison likely didn't inhabit the Italian and Iberian Peninsulas.[1]
Ranges of B. schoetensacki and steppe bison presumably overlapped for some extents.[1]
Genetics
A 2017 study which attributed Late Pleistocene European remains to B. schoetensacki found it to belong to a mitochondrial clade which is the sister group to modern wisent, and proposed the species as a whole is likely ancestral to modern wisent.[8][2] However, other studies have disputed this attribution, restricting B. schoetensacki to Early and Middle Pleistocene remains.[9]
^Leonardo Sorbelli, Marco Cherin, David M. Alba, Joan Madurell Malapeira, 2021, A review on Bison schoetensacki and its closest relatives through the early-Middle Pleistocene transition: Insights from the Vallparadís Section (NE Iberian Peninsula) and other European localities, edited by Danielle Schreve, Quaternary Science Reviews, Volume 261, DOI:106933, The Early-Middle Pleistocene Transition in Mediterranean Europe
^Marsolier-Kergoat, Marie Claude (2017). Evolutionary Biology: Self/Nonself Evolution, Species and Complex Traits Evolution, Methods and Concepts. Springer International Publishing. pp. 187–198. ISBN9783319615691.
^Leonardo Sorbelli, Marco Cherin, David M. Alba, Joan Madurell Malapeira, 2019, The Epivillafranchian Bison schoetensacki sample from the Vallparadís Section, The Early-Middle Pleistocene Transition in Mediterranean Europe
^Marsolier-Kergoat, Marie-Claude; Elalouf, Jean-Marc (2017), Pontarotti, Pierre (ed.), "The Descent of Bison", Evolutionary Biology: Self/Nonself Evolution, Species and Complex Traits Evolution, Methods and Concepts, Cham: Springer International Publishing, pp. 187–198, doi:10.1007/978-3-319-61569-1_10, ISBN978-3-319-61568-4, retrieved 2022-02-10
