Lange untangles the complex evolutionary lineages of mammal families, including the gomphotheres, elephant-like creatures that coexisted with humans at the end of the Pleistocene. You�ll learn about the geologic events that led to the ice ages, along with possible causes for the mass extinctions of so many species.

Find out how animals lived, fought, and died during the Ice Age.

The perfect introduction to the Ice Age, complete with ENORMOUS fold-out pages!

The fascinating lives and puzzling demise of some of the largest animals on earth. Until a few thousand years ago, creatures that could have been from a sci-fi thriller—including gorilla-sized lemurs, 500-pound birds, and crocodiles that weighed a ton or more—roamed the earth. These great beasts, or “megafauna,” lived on every habitable continent and on many islands. With a handful of exceptions, all are now gone. What caused the disappearance of these prehistoric behemoths? No one event can be pinpointed as a specific cause, but several factors may have played a role. Paleomammalogist Ross D. E. MacPhee explores them all, examining the leading extinction theories, weighing the evidence, and presenting his own conclusions. He shows how theories of human overhunting and catastrophic climate change fail to account for critical features of these extinctions, and how new thinking is needed to elucidate these mysterious losses. Along the way, we learn how time is determined in earth history; how DNA is used to explain the genomics and phylogenetic history of megafauna—and how synthetic biology and genetic engineering may be able to reintroduce these giants of the past. Until then, gorgeous four-color illustrations by Peter Schouten re-create these megabeasts here in vivid detail.

Earth's past is littered with the mysterious and unexplained: the pyramids, Easter Island, Stonehenge, dinosaurs, and the list goes on and on as science looks for clues to decipher these puzzles.One such mystery surrounds the now-extinct creature called the woolly mammoth. Author and meteorologist Michael Oard has studied the mammoth and its equally mysterious time period, the Ice Age, for many years and has come to some fascinating conclusions to help lift the fog engulfing the facts. Some of the questions he addresses include:What would cause the summer temperatures of the northern United States and European to plummet more than 50 degrees Fahrenheit?Why did mammoths become extinct across the entire earth at the same time as many other large mammals?Why are the mammoth carcasses found generally in standing positions?How could large lakes exist in what are today very dry, desert-like places?What was the source of the abnormal of moisture necessary for heavy snow?What caused the cold summer temperatures and heavy snowfall to persist for hundreds of years?In logical progression many other Ice Age topics are explained including super Ice Age floods, ice cores, man in the Ice Age, and the number of ice ages. This is one of the most difficult eras in geological history for a uniformitarian scientist (one who believes the earth evolved by slow processes over millions of years) to explain, simply because long ages of evolution cannot explain it. Provided here are plausible explanations of the seemingly unsolvable mysterious about the Ice Age and the woolly mammoths - Frozen in Time.

Until about 13,000 years ago, North America was home to a menagerie of massive mammals. Mammoths, camels, and lions walked the ground that has become Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles and foraged on the marsh land now buried beneath Chicago's streets. Then, just as the first humans reached the Americas, these Ice Age giants vanished forever. In Once and Future Giants, science writer Sharon Levy digs through the evidence surrounding Pleistocene large animal ("megafauna") extinction events worldwide, showing that understanding this history--and our part in it--is crucial for protecting the elephants, polar bears, and other great creatures at risk today. These surviving relatives of the Ice Age beasts now face the threat of another great die-off, as our species usurps the planet's last wild places while driving a warming trend more extreme than any in mammalian history. Deftly navigating competing theories and emerging evidence, Once and Future Giants examines the extent of human influence on megafauna extinctions past and present, and explores innovative conservation efforts around the globe. The key to modern-day conservation, Levy suggests, may lie fossilized right under our feet.

Featuring numerous illustrations, this book explores the many lessons to be learned from Pleistocene megafauna, including the role of humans in their extinction, their disappearance at the start of the Sixth Extinction, and what they might teach us about contemporary conservation crises. Long after the extinction of dinosaurs, when humans were still in the Stone Age, woolly rhinos, mammoths, mastodons, sabertooth cats, giant ground sloths, and many other spectacular large animals that are no longer with us roamed the Earth. These animals are regarded as “Pleistocene megafauna,” named for the geological era in which they lived—also known as the Ice Age. In Vanished Giants: The Lost World of the Ice Age, paleontologist Anthony J. Stuart explores the lives and environments of these animals, moving between six continents and several key islands. Stuart examines the animals themselves via what we’ve learned from fossil remains, and he describes the landscapes, climates, vegetation, ecological interactions, and other aspects of the animals’ existence. Illustrated throughout, Vanished Giants also offers a picture of the world as it was tens of thousands of years ago when these giants still existed. Unlike the case of the dinosaurs, there was no asteroid strike to blame for the end of their world. Instead, it appears that the giants of the Ice Age were driven to extinction by climate change, human activities—especially hunting—or both. Drawing on the latest evidence provided by radiocarbon dating, Stuart discusses these possibilities. The extinction of Ice Age megafauna can be seen as the beginning of the so-called Sixth Extinction, which is happening right now. This has important implications for understanding the likely fate of present-day animals in the face of contemporary climate change and vastly increasing human populations.

"Describes the characteristics, food, habitat, behavior, and extinction of dodos"--

An elementary exploration of mammoths, focusing on fossil evidence that helps explain how their big tusks and shaggy fur helped these plant-eating beasts adapt to the last Ice Age.

"Describes the characteristics, food, habitat, behavior, and extinction of woolly mammoths"--