Researchers uncover the cause of extinction for the biggest species of great ape in history.

Scientists reported on Wednesday that an old type of large ape may have become extinct due to climate change, which made their preferred fruits inaccessible during dry periods.

The Gigantopithecus blacki species, found in southern China, is the largest known great ape according to scientists. It could reach a height of 10 feet and weigh up to 650 pounds.

However, its dimensions could have potentially been a disadvantage.

According to Renaud Joannes-Boyau, a scientist at Southern Cross University in Australia and co-author of a study in the journal Nature, this creature is simply enormous. He explains that when resources become limited, its size prevents it from being able to climb trees in search of new food.

The large primates, similar to present-day orangutans, managed to exist for approximately 2 million years in the wooded areas of China’s Guangxi region. They consumed plant-based meals, feasting on fruits and flowers in lush rainforests, until the conditions began to shift.

The scientists studied pollen and sediment samples found in caves in Guangxi, along with fossilized teeth, to understand the decrease in fruit production by forests around 600,000 years ago, when the area began to have more frequent dry seasons.

According to the researchers, the disappearance of the giant apes was not sudden, but rather occurred sometime between 215,000 and 295,000 years ago.

Although smaller apes may have been capable of climbing trees in order to find alternative sources of food, the study conducted by the researchers found that larger apes primarily consumed tree bark, reeds, and other non-nutritious food items.

“When the forest changed, there was not enough food preferred by the species,” said co-author Zhang Yingqi of China’s Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology.

The majority of knowledge about the extinct great apes is derived from analyzing fossilized teeth and four sizable lower jaw bones, all of which were discovered in southern China. No intact skeletal remains have been uncovered.

Fossil records indicate that between 2 and 22 million years ago, there were numerous species of great apes living in Africa, Europe, and Asia. However, currently only gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos, orangutans, and humans are still in existence.

According to Rick Potts, who leads the Human Origins Program at the National Museum of Natural History, it is not known on which continent the great ape family originated, despite the fact that the first humans emerged in Africa. This information was not part of the study.

Source: independent.co.uk