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Demonstrates how Africa's physical features, savannas and abundant grazers enabled frugivorous apes to become savanna-living hunters.
List of contents
Preface; Foreword; List of abbreviations; Part I. The physical cradle: Land forms, geology, climate, hydrology and soils: 1. High Africa: Eroding surfaces; 2. Climate: Rainfall seasonality; 3. Water in rivers, lakes and wetlands; 4. Bedrock geology: Volcanic influences; 5. Soils: Foundations of fertility; Part II. The savanna garden: Grassy vegetation and plant dynamics: 6. Forms of savannah; 7. How savanna trees and grasses grow and compete; 8. Plant demography and dynamics: Fire traps; 9. Paleo-savannas: Expanding grasslands; Part III. The big mammal menagerie: Herbivores, carnivores and their ecosystem impacts: 10. Niche distinctions: resources versus risks; 11. Big fierce carnivores: Hunting versus scavenging; 12. Herbivore abundance: Bottom-up and top-down; 13. How large herbivores transform savanna ecosystems; 14. Paleo-faunas: Rise and fall of the biggest grazers; Part IV. Evolutionary transitions: From primate ancestors to modern humans: 15. Primate predecessors: From trees to ground; 16. Primate ecology: From forests into savannas; 17. How an ape became a hunter; 18. Cultural evolution: From tools to art and genes; 19. Reticulate evolution through turbulent times; 20. Prospects for a lonely planet; Index.
About the author
Norman Owen-Smith headed the Centre for African Ecology at the University of the Witwatersrand before his retirement as Emeritus Professor there. He is an A-rated scientist and Fellow of the Royal Society of South Africa. He received Gold Medals from the Zoological Society of Southern Africa and the South African Association for the Advancement of Science, Wildlife Excellence Award from the Southern African Wildlife Management Association, Honorary Life Membership in the Ecological Society of America, and was awarded a Harry Oppenheimer Fellowship in 2005. He has written or edited six books, including Megaherbivores: The Influence of Very Large Body Size on Ecology (Cambridge, 1988) and Adaptive Herbivore Ecology: From Resources to Populations in Variable Environments (Cambridge, 2002).
Summary
The book reaches out to palaeoanthropologists to explain how evolutionary adaptations were necessarily related to ecological shifts in savannas governed by seasonal dryness. For ecologists, it both outlines the fundamentals of savanna ecology and shows how its features nurtured the evolutionary transitions leading to modern humans.
