| Mergellus | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Smew (Mergellus albellus) | |
Scientific classification  | |
| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Aves |
| Order: | Anseriformes |
| Family: | Anatidae |
| Subfamily: | Anatinae |
| Genus: | Mergellus Selby, 1840 |
| Species | |
Mergellus is a genus of duck. The smew (Mergellus albellus) is the only living species, but an extinct species known as Mergellus mochanovi has also been described from Late Pleistocene deposits in the Yakutia region of Russia. [1]
Sakha, officially the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), is the largest republic of Russia, located in the Russian Far East, along the Arctic Ocean, with a population of one million. On top of being the largest republic in Russia, it also is the largest administrative division in the world. Sakha comprises half of the area of its governing Far Eastern Federal District, and is the world's largest country subdivision, covering over 3,083,523 square kilometers (1,190,555 sq mi). Yakutsk, which is the world's coldest major city, is its capital and largest city.
A pika is a small, mountain-dwelling mammal native to Asia and North America. With short limbs, a very round body, an even coat of fur, and no external tail, they resemble their close relative, the rabbit, but with short, rounded ears. The large-eared pika of the Himalayas and nearby mountains lives at elevations of more than 6,000 m (20,000 ft).
The smew is a species of duck and is the only living member of the genus Mergellus. Mergellus is a diminutive of Mergus and albellus is from Latin albus "white". This genus is closely related to Mergus and is sometimes included in it, though it might be closer to the goldeneyes (Bucephala). The smew has hybridized with the common goldeneye.
Mergus is the genus of the typical mergansers fish-eating ducks in the subfamily Anatinae. The genus name is a Latin word used by Pliny the Elder and other Roman authors to refer to an unspecified waterbird.
The woolly rhinoceros is an extinct species of rhinoceros that inhabited northern Eurasia during the Pleistocene epoch. The woolly rhinoceros was a member of the Pleistocene megafauna. The woolly rhinoceros was covered with long, thick hair that allowed it to survive in the extremely cold, harsh mammoth steppe. It had a massive hump reaching from its shoulder and fed mainly on herbaceous plants that grew in the steppe. Mummified carcasses preserved in permafrost and many bone remains of woolly rhinoceroses have been found. Images of woolly rhinoceroses are found among cave paintings in Europe and Asia. The range of the woolly rhinoceros contracted towards Siberia beginning around 17,000 years ago, with the youngest known records being around 14,000 years old in northeast Siberia, coinciding with the Bølling–Allerød warming, which likely disrupted its habitat, with environmental DNA records possibly extending the range of the species around 9,800 years ago. Its closest living relative is the Sumatran rhinoceros.
The steppe bison or steppe wisent is an extinct species of bison. It was widely distributed across the mammoth steppe, ranging from Western Europe to eastern Beringia in North America during the Late Pleistocene. It is ancestral to all North American bison, including ultimately modern American bison. Three chronological subspecies, Bison priscus priscus, Bison priscus mediator, and Bison priscus gigas, have been suggested.
Panthera spelaea, commonly known as the cave lion, is an extinct Panthera species that was native to Eurasia and northwest North America during the Pleistocene epoch. Genetic analysis of ancient DNA has revealed that while closely related, it was a distinct species genetically isolated from the modern lion, with the genetic divergence between the two species estimated at around 500,000 years ago. The earliest fossils of the P. spelaea lineage in Eurasia date to around 700,000 years ago. It is closely related and probably ancestral to the American lion. The species ranged from Western Europe to eastern Beringia in North America, and was a prominent member of the mammoth steppe fauna, and an important apex predator across its range. It became extinct about 13,000 years ago. It closely resembled living lions with a coat of yellowish-grey fur though unlike extant lions, males appear to have lacked manes.
The mammoth steppe, also known as steppe-tundra, was once the Earth's most extensive biome. During glacial periods in the later Pleistocene it stretched east-to-west, from the Iberian Peninsula in the west of Europe, then across Eurasia and through Beringia and into the Yukon in northwest Canada; from north-to-south, the steppe reached from the Arctic southward to southern Europe, Central Asia and northern China. The mammoth steppe was cold and dry, and relatively featureless, though climate, topography, and geography varied considerably throughout. Certain areas of the biome—such as coastal areas—had wetter and milder climates than others. Some areas featured rivers which, through erosion, naturally created gorges, gulleys, or small glens. The continual glacial recession and advancement over millennia contributed more to the formation of larger valleys and different geographical features. Overall, however, the steppe is known to be flat and expansive grassland. The vegetation was dominated by palatable, high-productivity grasses, herbs and willow shrubs.
The wood bison or mountain bison, is a distinct northern subspecies or ecotype of the American bison. Its original range included much of the boreal forest regions of Alaska, Yukon, western Northwest Territories, northeastern British Columbia, northern Alberta, and northwestern Saskatchewan.
The wild horse is a species of the genus Equus, which includes as subspecies the modern domesticated horse as well as the endangered Przewalski's horse. The European wild horse, also known as the tarpan, that went extinct in the late 19th or early 20th century has previously been treated as the nominate subspecies of wild horse, Equus ferus ferus, but more recent studies have cast doubt on whether tarpans were truly wild or if they actually were feral horses or hybrids.
Pleistocene rewilding is the advocacy of the reintroduction of extant Pleistocene megafauna, or the close ecological equivalents of extinct megafauna. It is an extension of the conservation practice of rewilding, which aims to restore functioning, self-sustaining ecosystems through practices that may include species reintroductions.
Bison occidentalis is an extinct species of bison that lived in North America, from about 11,700 to 5,000 years ago, spanning the end of the Pleistocene to the mid-Holocene.
Dick "Sir Mammoth" Mol is a Dutch paleontologist - a specialist in the field of mammoths for almost three decades. He is a research associate of several museums. Mol's primary focus is on mammals of the Quaternary period, including mammoths and extinct rhinoceros species.
During the Pleistocene, wolves were widely distributed across the Northern Hemisphere. Some Pleistocene wolves, such as Beringian wolves and those from Japan, exhibited large body size in comparison to modern gray wolf populations. Genetic analysis of the remains of Late Pleistocene wolves suggest that across their range populations of wolves maintained considerable gene flow between each other and thus there was limited genetic divergence between them. Modern wolves mostly draw their ancestry from some Siberian populations of Late Pleistocene gray wolves, which largely replaced other gray wolf populations after the Last Glacial Maximum.
Anser djuktaiensis or Dyuktai goose is an extinct goose, similar to but larger than the extant greylag goose, the remains of which have been found in the Dyuktai Cave near the Dyuktai River in Yakutia, Russia. The cave is dated from Upper Pleistocene to possibly Holocene in age.
Canis mosbachensis is an extinct wolf that inhabited Europe from the late Early Pleistocene to the Middle Pleistocene, around 1.4 million to 400,000 years ago. Canis mosbachensis is widely considered to have descended from the earlier Canis etruscus, and to be the ancestor of the living grey wolf with some considering it as a subspecies of the wolf as Canis lupus mosbachensis. The morphological distinction between C. mosbachensis and C. lupus has historically been vague, and attribution of fossils to C. mosbachensis or to C. lupus around the transition time between the two species is ambiguous.
Khorotherium is a genus of extinct mammaliaforms. The type and only species, Khorotherium yakutensis, is known from the Lower Cretaceous Batylykh Formation in Western Yakutia, Russia. It belongs to the family Tegotheriidae from the order Docodonta, alongside Sibirotherium from the same region, it is amongst the youngest known docodonts.
Equus lenensis, commonly known as the Lena horse, is an extinct species of horse from the Late Pleistocene and Holocene of Siberia. Some sources have considered it a subspecies of the wild horse. The species is known from several preserved frozen specimens.
Mergellus mochanovi is an extinct species of Mergellus that lived in Russia during the Late Pleistocene.
