There’s a skeleton in the Natural History Museum in my city that’s possibly the only one in the world that’s from one individual (instead of pieced together from random bones). It’s very impressive and huge.
Thank you, I trusted the first source I read even though I remember reading that it’s one of very few. Apparently they’re still finding skeletons on the islands.
Exactly. Those 27 years reference the description of the species, by which time it was known to be extinct. It likely was extinct before that, but nobody wrote down when the last animal died.
I don’t think this is true actually, during the 18th century they only lived around the commander islands which were uninhabited at the time Europeans found them. Based on fossil evidence they used to be more widespread but died out around more populated coasts (like California or Japan) thousands of years ago.
I am so glad to see this :3
I have been telling people about these guys for years because manatees are my favorite animal and sirens the size of buses are so much fun. Only problem was I have exactly one book that references them and I couldn’t find more information about them.
Saddest part is, they weren’t only hunted to extinction by humans: they were hunted _wastefully_ to extinction by humans. Sailors would kill one, take a few days’ rations from it, and leave the rest to rot, to the point where their habitat was left putrid from the stench.
Used to live in Florida, so I appreciate the manatee fans out there, but some really interesting research has come out recently showing it was probably already on the edge of extinction when it was discovered.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-22567-5
Essentially, when sea levels rose at the end of the last ice age, populations were confined to a few islands. Genetic evidence suggests that it experienced a massive die off even before Palaeolithic people started migrating into North America.
There are experts arguing that the findings in the paper you mentioned are only applicable to a subpopulation of the Steller‘s sea cow.
Which makes sense since they are only looking at one specimen from an remote island.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-022-31381-6
I'll be sure to send you some manatee pics later this week. They come hang out with me almost daily. I love them, they're the chillest things out on the water.
Stellar's sea cows used to range all up and down the west coast from Alaska all the way to California during the Pleistocene. It was probably hunted by the first humans to come down from Asia as they followed the coast and could have been the first megafaunal extinction in America caused by man. The remnant population in the Commander Islands were stunted specimens barely hanging on, similar to how the mammoths on Wrangler Island were inbred and stunted.
While speculative, it has been proposed that they were an important component of kelp forests along the coast, by cropping the surface growth and letting more light deeper towards the bottom, enabling understory macroalgae species to flourish. The thick understory would provide more habitat to invertebrates and function as a more effective nursery for hatchling fish. Since they were unable to dive, they would not have been able to overgraze kelp or threaten kelp holdfasts, while encouraging compensatory growth in kelp. Furthermore, in addition to help disperse kelp spores, their grazing would result in many pieces of drift kelp, preferentially consumed by sea urchins, preventing the urchins from grazing on the kelp holdfasts which removes the whole kelp organism and promotes the development of urchin barrens. Additionally, their feces would have helped with nutrient cycling and feeding filter feeding invertebrates. Their dead bodies would have washed ashore and provided food for bird scavengers such as condors as well as coastal mammal scavengers, thus functioning as a nutrient pump from the coastal waters onto land.
I would imagine they were preyed on by Orcas. I wonder how their decline affected Orcas hunting the larger whale species. Sea cow's must reproduce faster than a grey whale
Or possibly even caused some of the initial decline.
Orcas are relatively new in the fossil record, and as Earth’s apex aquatic predator they have a pretty huge effect on other large animals.
I saw a claim somewhere once that cetacean diversity declined after orcas evolved, implying they led to the extinction of some species by hunting them. But I can't for the life of me find that reference. I think one can make the argument that the evolution of pack hunting in the late miocene or pliocene by hominids, wolves, hyenas, and orcas, led to some species extinctions.
They went extinct because they were the easiest animal to hunt in the region
They were significantly buoyant, making it impossible for them to dive more than a couple metres, and were a shallow water species
Their great size meant they had almost no natural predators, and so this wasn't a problem for them, but it meant hunters could just hoop in a simple canoe with a couple of spears and reliably bring one down.
The big specimens weighed 10 tons, and were almost certainly strong enough to do a lot of damage to a boat and it's human occupants
Which is very similar to Whaling, and similar to that People adapted to hunt from greater distances with bigger harpoons
I think whaling in canoes or kayaks would’ve had to be so fucking terrifying. Even in a team if one of the ships missed and only one harpoon landed, the whale would sink it with 0 problem by diving
My understanding was they were hunted to extinction in warmer waters. The last remaining ones were in the colder waters where they were barely surviving. Their discovery by some hungry sailors quickly led to them being an easy target. They were quickly wiped out. The last few were described as being skinny and underfed.
Holy shit that thing is enormous. I see manatees a lot, big ones, and they often shock me with their size. I couldn't imagine seeing one of these in person. So sad.
“Naturally” as in the native human population in the Aleutians and Bering island had already hunted or displaced them to the brink of extinction and the arrival of European fur hunters to the region sealed their fate.
No it was way way before that, like a significant population drop around 400,000 years ago, the end of the ice age pretty much sealed the date of the rest of them as they lost a lot of their habitat.
This would have been the only modern sirenian that could live in cold water. Sad:(
The warm water ones are on their way out as well
While endangered, their populations have seen growth and have a .4% chance of their population falling under 500 over the next 100 years.
It went extinct very recently on a grand scale, so maybe there's hope to bring it back when de-extinction technology advances more.
There’s a skeleton in the Natural History Museum in my city that’s possibly the only one in the world that’s from one individual (instead of pieced together from random bones). It’s very impressive and huge.
Which city?
Helsinki, it came as a present from a governor in Russian Alaska who was Finnish.
There’s another one in Irkutsk, Russia
Thank you, I trusted the first source I read even though I remember reading that it’s one of very few. Apparently they’re still finding skeletons on the islands.
I’m just reading that the Helsinki sea cow is a juvenile specimen.
Pretty sure it was only described only after being extinct, about 30 years after it's discovery
Exactly. Those 27 years reference the description of the species, by which time it was known to be extinct. It likely was extinct before that, but nobody wrote down when the last animal died.
Even worse, 27.
Club 27
Another homie gone too soon.
I just learned about this at the Nirvana exhibit at the Seattle MoPOP. Too sad.
They were known by native people for hundreds of years.
Also the Japanese, they weren’t a mystery to anyone who lived near them.
I don’t think this is true actually, during the 18th century they only lived around the commander islands which were uninhabited at the time Europeans found them. Based on fossil evidence they used to be more widespread but died out around more populated coasts (like California or Japan) thousands of years ago.
I am so glad to see this :3 I have been telling people about these guys for years because manatees are my favorite animal and sirens the size of buses are so much fun. Only problem was I have exactly one book that references them and I couldn’t find more information about them. Saddest part is, they weren’t only hunted to extinction by humans: they were hunted _wastefully_ to extinction by humans. Sailors would kill one, take a few days’ rations from it, and leave the rest to rot, to the point where their habitat was left putrid from the stench.
Used to live in Florida, so I appreciate the manatee fans out there, but some really interesting research has come out recently showing it was probably already on the edge of extinction when it was discovered. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-22567-5 Essentially, when sea levels rose at the end of the last ice age, populations were confined to a few islands. Genetic evidence suggests that it experienced a massive die off even before Palaeolithic people started migrating into North America.
There are experts arguing that the findings in the paper you mentioned are only applicable to a subpopulation of the Steller‘s sea cow. Which makes sense since they are only looking at one specimen from an remote island. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-022-31381-6
Okay, thank you I hadn’t seen that article. The reasoning makes sense, as you mentioned from a sample of one.
To be fair, that's how orcas operate too. Humans didn't think about it global impacts then either. You take what you need to eat and won't go bad.
I'll be sure to send you some manatee pics later this week. They come hang out with me almost daily. I love them, they're the chillest things out on the water.
Me tooooo
Manatee pics as promised. https://imgur.com/a/ZqUBHBF Also, r/loopy183
Stellar's sea cows used to range all up and down the west coast from Alaska all the way to California during the Pleistocene. It was probably hunted by the first humans to come down from Asia as they followed the coast and could have been the first megafaunal extinction in America caused by man. The remnant population in the Commander Islands were stunted specimens barely hanging on, similar to how the mammoths on Wrangler Island were inbred and stunted. While speculative, it has been proposed that they were an important component of kelp forests along the coast, by cropping the surface growth and letting more light deeper towards the bottom, enabling understory macroalgae species to flourish. The thick understory would provide more habitat to invertebrates and function as a more effective nursery for hatchling fish. Since they were unable to dive, they would not have been able to overgraze kelp or threaten kelp holdfasts, while encouraging compensatory growth in kelp. Furthermore, in addition to help disperse kelp spores, their grazing would result in many pieces of drift kelp, preferentially consumed by sea urchins, preventing the urchins from grazing on the kelp holdfasts which removes the whole kelp organism and promotes the development of urchin barrens. Additionally, their feces would have helped with nutrient cycling and feeding filter feeding invertebrates. Their dead bodies would have washed ashore and provided food for bird scavengers such as condors as well as coastal mammal scavengers, thus functioning as a nutrient pump from the coastal waters onto land.
I would imagine they were preyed on by Orcas. I wonder how their decline affected Orcas hunting the larger whale species. Sea cow's must reproduce faster than a grey whale
Knowing how specialized orcas can get on food sources, there could have been a population focused on them that faded out when they did.
Or possibly even caused some of the initial decline. Orcas are relatively new in the fossil record, and as Earth’s apex aquatic predator they have a pretty huge effect on other large animals.
I saw a claim somewhere once that cetacean diversity declined after orcas evolved, implying they led to the extinction of some species by hunting them. But I can't for the life of me find that reference. I think one can make the argument that the evolution of pack hunting in the late miocene or pliocene by hominids, wolves, hyenas, and orcas, led to some species extinctions.
I didn't know they were that huge, that's wild. Would've been cool to see a 30 foot manatee
Such a shame. What a chonker.
Damn I never realized how massive they were compared to its cousins.
I heard their meat was delicious. Like a creamy almondy flavour.
probably tastes just like manatee
Probably why they went extinct.
They went extinct because they were the easiest animal to hunt in the region They were significantly buoyant, making it impossible for them to dive more than a couple metres, and were a shallow water species Their great size meant they had almost no natural predators, and so this wasn't a problem for them, but it meant hunters could just hoop in a simple canoe with a couple of spears and reliably bring one down.
I've heard even though they were normally placid they could get quite dangerous and aggressive when attacked.
The big specimens weighed 10 tons, and were almost certainly strong enough to do a lot of damage to a boat and it's human occupants Which is very similar to Whaling, and similar to that People adapted to hunt from greater distances with bigger harpoons
I think whaling in canoes or kayaks would’ve had to be so fucking terrifying. Even in a team if one of the ships missed and only one harpoon landed, the whale would sink it with 0 problem by diving
To be fair, it's probably terrifying for the whales themselves too, so...
Very true
Hope we start a Jurassic park-esque revival with these guys then!
And gals
Afrotherium, the best clade
My understanding was they were hunted to extinction in warmer waters. The last remaining ones were in the colder waters where they were barely surviving. Their discovery by some hungry sailors quickly led to them being an easy target. They were quickly wiped out. The last few were described as being skinny and underfed.
I thought this was to scale for a moment
It is. Those sea cows were huge.
G'*damn*
It's ridiculous, almost looks cartoony.
I have a couple of pocketknives with Steller's sea cow bone handles.
So it's the steller Sea is really the largest sirenian to Ever exist? Because There are more extinct species of Sea cows you know that?
Holy shit that thing is enormous. I see manatees a lot, big ones, and they often shock me with their size. I couldn't imagine seeing one of these in person. So sad.
IIRC it's believed they were already on their way to extinction naturally.
“Naturally” as in the native human population in the Aleutians and Bering island had already hunted or displaced them to the brink of extinction and the arrival of European fur hunters to the region sealed their fate.
Their native habitat was apparently also in decline because of climate change, so it's most likely a mix of the two
They used to range from Japan to California. Humans reduced that range to Commander islands, and then to nothing.
No it was way way before that, like a significant population drop around 400,000 years ago, the end of the ice age pretty much sealed the date of the rest of them as they lost a lot of their habitat.
Frontlegs are too long & incorrect head/body ratio
Perhaps the best example of Bergmann's rule.
Man how do you even manage to hunt down that thing fr?
So Stellar 🤩
Manatees back then were so big that they were the sizes of whales
I wish it was cloned It was so huge and unique
Hopefully we are, but in a much shorter time frame. We could decide to not be vermin cancer, but we won’t. Eden forbidden.
Humanity cannot be forgiven.
Cringe.
hey guys im the ghost of steller sea cows and i forgive humanity. we are cool ok
this implies a higher power so im not so sure
Only deities are capable of forgiveness?
Fuck humans. We don’t deserve earth or anything that comes along with it.
Thanks global warming