A study of carnivore competition in riparian and open habitats of modern savannas and its implications for hominid behavioral modelling

Some of the models proposed to explain Plio-Pleistocene hominid behavior an d the formation of early East African archaeological sites are based on the assumption that the riparian habitats in which most of them occur were pla ces of low interspecific competition. Competition is expressed here in term s of carnivore and hominid. interactions. In this paper, a study of carnivo re interaction in open and closed habitats is presented. The results indica te that riparian woodland shows the lowest degree of competition in savanna ecosystems. This suggests that if Plio-Pleistocene carnivores were adapted like their modern counterparts, the paleoecological settings of early site s could have provided hominids with enough safety to process carcasses and behave as shown in "central-place", "near-kill location" and "refuge" forag ing models. (C) 2001 Academic Press.