Modern and Holocene 13C and 15N of huemul (Hippocamelus bisulcus) during the Holocene in Perito Moreno National Park, Santa Cruz, Argentina. Implications to specie biogeography and hunter-gatherer faunal exploitation

TESSONE, AUGUSTO; DE NIGRIS, MARIANA; FERNÁNDEZ, PABLO MARCELO

San Rafael, Mendoza, Argentina

Congreso; 12th International Conference of ICAZ; 2014

International Council of Archaeozoology

The huemul (Hippocamelus bisulcus) was one of the preys exploited by hunter-gatherers in Patagonia during the Holocene. At present huemul is restricted to the Andean forest, threatened with extinction, but it has been proposed that in the past it could have inhabited open environments. Thus, the objective of this work is to contribute to the knowledge of the paleoecology and biogeography of huemul in Southern Patagonia through the study of the isotopic signal of the carbon and the nitrogen present in the collagen of their bones. In Patagonia, previous studies show that the contiguous forest and steppe environments present differential isotopic signals, allowing to associate herbivores with one of these habitats. For this purpose modern (N = 7) and archaeological (N = 21) samples from Perito Moreno National Park (Santa Cruz, Argentina) were analyzed. The results were compared with modern (N = 7) and archaeological (N = 25) samples of guanaco (Lama guanicoe), species associated with the steppe in this area. The isotopic values of huemul do not evidence changes during the Holocene although there are differences with the values of modern samples of δ15N. Moreover, the huemul values differ from values of guanaco along all the temporal sequence. In this way, at this spatial scale, isotopic signals of huemul do not show a greater use of open areas during the Holocene as it is recorded today.