by Gary Manners
July 02, 2026
from Ancient-Origins Website

 

Artist's reconstruction of Clovis life 13,000 years ago

showing mammoth butchery and tool crafting.

Source: UAF / Science Advances

A new and innovative scientific study on early native peoples of America (Hemisphere-wide evidence of Early Paleoindian Megaherbivore Specialization) has indicated that these early inhabitants were successful large game hunter-gatherers, and in fact most of their food consisted of the largest game available at any time across North America.

The research found that early hunter-gatherers hunted "megafauna" from Alaska all the way down into South America.

This study makes an important contribution to human history as it provides the most convincing evidence to date for how early humans dispersed across two continents so quickly.

The researchers reviewed the available data from 50 different archaeological sites located throughout the Americas and found that 83% - 88% of the food consumed at the time by three early culturally distinct hunter gather groups in the Western Hemisphere was derived from very large plant-eating animals (megafauna) such as,

• mammoths

• gomphotheres

• giant ground sloths (all large herbivores)

The research was conducted by Professor Ben Potter, from the University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF) Department of Anthropology, along with Dr. James Chatters, a researcher at McMaster University.

Their study has just been published in the journal Science Advances.

 

First Americans hunted largest game

through Western Hemisphere.

(Robert Egan / Science Advances)

Rare Giants Dominated the Prehistoric Menu

The study focused on 3 widespread cultural groups:

1. Eastern Beringians in Alaska and the Yukon

2. the Clovis culture across North America

3. Fishtail Projectile Point people in South America

To determine their diets, scientists analyzed animal bones at campsites and calculated the expected natural abundance of various species in the surrounding landscape.

By multiplying individual animal counts by each species' estimated edible biomass, the team found that megaherbivores accounted for the overwhelming majority of food available, even when small-animal counts were artificially inflated in their models.

"The test of dietary specialization isn't just how many of a given animal you find at an ancient campsite," Potter explained in a UAF press release.

 

"It's what the record looks like relative to natural abundance.

 

If early people were dietary generalists, you'd expect to find the most common animals would be more common in peoples’ campsites."

Instead, researchers found that animals like mammoths and ground sloths, which were relatively rare, completely dominated the archaeological record, while abundant small mammals like rabbits and mice barely appeared.

Shared Prey and the Rapid Spread of Humanity

The focus on hunting large herbivores also explains why early toolkits, such as the distinctive fluted projectile points used by the Clovis people, appear very similar across vastly different landscapes from California to Maine to Florida, and even at sites in South America.

Because these ancient hunters were targeting the same types of massive animals, they had no need to adapt their technology to local conditions.

Notably, fishing gear and plant-processing tools were absent from these early sites.

Building a diet around large mammals allowed these specialist hunter-gatherers to expand rapidly across the continents. When generalist hunter-gatherers move into unfamiliar territory, they usually need generations to learn about local small game and edible plants.

However, as study co-author Mat Wooller noted,

"Mammoths, for example, can cover a tremendous range and occupy vast territories.

 

In effect, specialist hunter-gatherers used their knowledge of megafauna, like mammoths, to expand successfully across the continents rather than learning about each localized ecosystem they encountered."

Skeleton of the Megatherium,

a giant ground sloth hunted by early Americans.

(APK/CC BY 4.0)

A Southward Wave of Extinctions

Evidence from this study supports the theory that Pleistocene megafauna extinction and human immigration occurred in roughly parallel timeframes.

This suggests a link between the two via waves of human migration across continents.

Examples of this occur,

• in Beringia (Alaska and the Yukon), where extinction of the woolly mammoth and horse occurred over 13,300 years ago, in North America, megafauna that were present during the Clovis Culture disappeared around 12,800 years ago

   

• in South America, gomphotheres and the giant ground sloth survived until approximately 11,600 years ago

Potter notes that this sequential arrival, overlap and extinction pattern repeatedly supports the hypothesis that human hunting was a major factor in Pleistocene megafauna extinction; likely augmented by climate changes that affected the size and quality of the habitats of megafauna, thus increasing their vulnerability to hunting pressures.

Potter adds:

"Megaherbivores reproduce slowly, space births widely and, as adults, have no natural predators.

 

They would have had no learned wariness of new, technologically sophisticated human hunter-gatherer populations."