Estimación de la edad de muerte de guanacos juveniles a partir de las dimensiones de los huesos largos no fusionados. Estructura de edad y estacionalidad en el campo volcánico de Pali Aike (sitio Orejas de Burro 1)

L’HEUREUX, GABRIELA ; KAUFMANN C. A.

Magallania

Universidad de Magallanes

Lugar: Punta Arenas; Año: 2012 vol. 40 p. 151 - 220

0718-0209

Lama guanicoe (guanaco) is the best represented land mammal in continental archaeological hunter-gatherer sites during the Holocene in Patagonia and the Pampas of South America. The main objective of this paper is to develop a model to estimate the age of immature guanacos by the length of their long bones, which will help discriminate age in young bone specimens of this species. The individuals studied belong to a comparative collection of modern guanaco specimens from the Cinco Chañares locality, Rio Negro province, Northern Patagonia, Argentina. The correlation analyses show that the association between greatest length (GL) and age was very high for all unfused long bones, with highly significant probability levels (P < 0.01). This allowed us to develop four predictive models to estimate the age-at-death for juvenile guanacos using a simple regression analysis. The use of new methodological tools that improve knowledge of age structure in fossil assemblages of Lama guanicoe significantly contribute to the discussion and interpretation of prey selection strategies and seasonality of guanaco exploitation by Patagonian and Pampean hunter-gatherer groups during the Holocene.