Dietary flexibility may have helped large predators survive after last ice age

During the late Pleistocene, a remarkably diverse assemblage of large-bodied mammals inhabited the "mammoth steppe," a cold and dry yet productive environment that extended from western Europe through northern Asia and across the Bering land bridge to the Yukon. Of the large predators--wolves, bears, and big cats--only the wolves and bears were able to maintain their ranges well after the end of the last ice age.

A new study led by researchers at the University of California, Santa Cruz, suggests that dietary flexibility may have been an important factor giving wolves and bears an edge over saber-toothed cats and cave lions.

"We found that dietary flexibility was strongly species-specific, and that large cats were relatively inflexible predators compared to wolves and bears. This is a key observation, as large cats have suffered severe range contractions since the last glacial maximum, whereas wolves and bears have ranges that remain similar to their Pleistocene ranges," said Justin Yeakel, first author of a paper on the new findings published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B. [...]  UC Santa Cruz  via The Archaeology News Network