Talk:Babakotia/Archive 1

Dental formula

The dental formula of Babakotia radofilai was the same as the other indriids and sloth lemurs:...

since B. radofilai is a sloth lemur and not an indriid shouldn't this phrase be more like:

The dental formula of Babakotia radofilai was the same as the other sloth lemurs and indriids:...

--Egmontaz♤ ^talk 20:11, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Good catch! Thanks. – VisionHolder « talk » 20:17, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Extiction

One more question: In the lead it is stated that "...may have died out prior to the arrival of humans on the island,..." but in section Extinction it is stated: "is thought to have disappeared shortly after the arrival of humans to the island". Isn't this a bit inconsistent? --Egmontaz♤ ^talk 06:04, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

The sources are not explicitly clear about this, but if you read them, they imply the reasoning. In the case of the extinct lemurs, all were larger than 10 kg. In fact, no living lemur exceeds 10 kg. Since the single radiocarbon date for Babakotia place it within 2,000 to 3,000 years of human arrival, it is very likely that it, too, exhibited the same pattern as the other large, extinct lemurs: decline after human arrival and then extinction within the last 1,000 years. If it did die out before human arrival, it would be the only known case of an extinction that predates human arrival. Although it's possible, many researchers suspect that future subfossil finds and radiocarbon dating will show that it survived until much more recently, just like all the other Malagasy megafauna. – VisionHolder « talk » 14:58, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Nevertheless, as Egmontaz said, the article was inconsistent; I've edited it now on the basis of your explanation. Ucucha 15:07, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

Ahh... I see. Sorry for the misunderstanding. Thanks for catching it! – VisionHolder « talk » 15:15, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

That's what I meant, thank you both! --Egmontaz♤ ^talk 17:58, 26 August 2010 (UTC)