The biodiversity of the island has its roots in a process known as insular miniaturisation, where a lack of predators and resources can cause normally large species to shrink. It is the home of the Komodo dragon as well as a number of unique species such as the Flores giant rat. ![]() The island of Flores is located in southeast Indonesia, near to the island of Komodo. What is special about the prehistoric fauna of Flores? robustus may have been the last in a lineage of giant marabou stork which were gradually wiped out as our Homo sapiens ancestors spread across the world. 'This would have been tough competition for a one-metre-high hominin, and it is not unlikely that they were often left picking up the leftovers.' 'To gain access to carcasses, they would have had to compete with these large birds, vultures, and Komodo dragons.' ![]() floresiensis, they might have been scavengers,' Hanneke explains. 'Although we know little about the diet of H. It forms a part of an unusual group of Pleistocene animals found on the island of Flores, Indonesia, which is renowned for unique species including elephant-like mammals known as Stegodon and the human relatives Homo floresiensis, otherwise known as 'hobbits', who stood just over a metre tall.ĭr Hanneke Meijer, who led a study describing the new fossils, says that the storks' ability to fly would have made them a formidable competitor for these hominins. ![]() Until recently, it was thought to have been confined to the ground, but the discovery of more bones now shows it was able to fly. Over 50,000 years ago, giant carnivorous storks would have competed with ancient hominins for food on a tropical island.ĭescribed in 2010, Leptoptilos robustus is an extinct bird species which stood almost two metres tall.
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