August 13, 2018, Pennsylvania
State University
Somewhere in the American
Southwest or northern Mexico, there are probably the ruins of a scarlet macaw
breeding operation dating to between 900 and 1200 C.E., according to a team of
archaeologists who sequenced the mitochondrial DNA of bird remains found in the
Chaco Canyon and Mimbres areas of New Mexico.
Remains of a thriving prehistoric
avian culture and breeding colony of scarlet macaws exist at the northern
Mexican site of Paquimé, or Casas Grande. However, this community existed from
1250 to 1450, well after the abandonment of Chaco Canyon, and could not have
supplied these birds to Southwest communities
prior to the 13th century, said Richard George, graduate student in
anthropology, Penn State.
Historically, scarlet macaws
lived from South America to eastern coastal Mexico and Guatemala, thousands of
miles from the American Southwest. Previously, researchers thought that
ancestral Puebloan people might have traveled to these natural breeding areas
and brought birds back, but the logistics of transporting adolescent birds are
difficult. None of the sites where these early macaw remains were found contained
evidence of breeding—eggshells, pens or perches.
"We were interested in the
prehistoric scarlet macaw population history and the impacts of human direct
management," said George. "Especially any evidence for directed
breeding or changes in the genetic diversity that could co-occur with different
trade networks."
The researchers sequenced the
mitochondrial DNA of 20 scarlet macaw specimens, but were only able to obtain
full sequences from 14. They then directly radiocarbon-dated all 14 birds with
complete or near complete genomes and found they fell between 900 and 1200 CE.
"We looked at the full
mitochondrial genome of over 16,000 base pairs to understand the maternal
relationships represented in the Chaco Canyon and Mimbres regions," said
George.
No comments:
Post a Comment