When beremendiin shrews disappeared in East Asia, or how we can estimate fossil redeposition

ABSTRACT

The current paper first time describes a small Beremendia from the late Pleistocene deposits in the Koridornaya Cave locality (Russian Far East), which associated with the extinct Beremendia minor. The paper is the first attempt to use a comparative analytical method to evaluate a possible case of redeposition of fossil remains of this shrew. In this case, the 'comparative' part of the method corresponds to the 'faunistic approach' of Jelle Reumer, and the 'analytical' part of the method corresponds to his extended 'morphological approach. ’ The analytic method uses morphospace size estimation (MSE) based on principal component analysis and estimation of the variance to evaluate redeposition of Beremendia minor from the late Pleistocene deposits in the Koridornaya Cave. This result allows us to suggest the significant environmental contribution to the East Asian beremendiin extinction, such as climatic fluctuation, landscape changes and shrew community changes between the late Pliocene and early Pleistocene. We discuss the last remains of East Asian Beremendia (Peisorex) described from the Chinese early Pleistocene localities (Chiachiashan, Haimao, Renzidong) and the last remains of Lunanosorex described from the Chinese late Pliocene localities (Qipanshan Hill and Houxushan Hill). MSE was performed for soricine tribes with the ‘elongated’ condylar process.

KEYWORDS:

• Soricidae
• Beremendia
• late Pleistocene
• fossil redeposition
• morphospace size
• East Asia

Acknowledgments

This study was completed within the framework of the Federal themes of the Zoological Institute no. АААА-А19-119032590102-7 “Phylogeny, morphology, and systematics of placental mammals.” This study was partly funded by Project nos. 18-04-00327 and 19-04-00049 of the Russian Foundation for Fundamental Investigations. The study partly used the collection materials of the Zoological Institute Russian Academy of Sciences (http://www.ckp-rf.ru/usu/73561/) and the Federal Scientific Centre of the East Asia Terrestrial Biodiversity, FEB RAS. It was supported by the Ministry of Science and Higher Education program for Bioresource Collections. Authors are grateful to P.D. Polly and two anonymous reviewers for reviewing our manuscript and contributing to its improvement. Authors also grateful Dr. Alexei V. Abramov for consultation on a mole shrew biology. 

Authors’ contributions

LV: a general conception, design, analysis and interpretation of the data and results; drafting the article and preparing of all graphic materials; geometric morphometric analysis; corresponding author.

VO, MT and MV: excavation of Beremendia remains (FSC RJARV-KorC-01) from Koridornaya Cave locality (Russian Far East); revising the manuscript text and images; discussion on the Beremendia redeposition possibility; approval of the final version.

VO: preliminary preparation of fossil remains of Beremendia (FSC RJARV-KorC-01); species determination and taphonomic description of the material on other shrews specimens from Koridornaya Cave (9 species of Sorex, Neomys and Crocidura; n = 717); SEM-imaging, shrew measurements; revising the manuscript text and images.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This research was funded in part by the Russian Foundation for Fundamental Investigations [grant number 18-04-00327] and [grant number 19-04-00049].