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Of Mice and Rats (and All Manners of Voles) - Ep 55
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This episode of ArchaeoAnimals is about all creatures small and smaller! Tune in to learn more about small rodents and insectivores and their importance for reconstructing palaeoenvironments, characterising human-animal interactions, as well as their slow but inevitable spread through the near entirety of the globe. Case studies include the house mouse in the Levant, the Pacific rat in Mangareva, and Deer Mice and Montane Vole in Washington, USA.
Transcripts
For rough transcripts of this episode go to https://www.archpodnet.com/animals/55
Links and Sources
- Baker, P., & Worley, F. (2019). Animal bones and archaeology: recovery to archive. Historic England.
- Cucchi, Thomas, et al. (2014) "The changing pace of insular life: 5000 years of microevolution in the Orkney vole (Microtus arvalis orcadensis)." Evolution 68.10. 2804-2820.
- Fraser, M., Sten, S., & Götherström, A. (2012). Neolithic Hedgehogs (Erinaceus europaeus) from the Island of Gotland show early contacts with the Swedish mainland. Journal of Archaeological Science, 39(2), 229-233.
- Lyman, R. L. (2003). Lessons from temporal variation in the mammalian faunas from two collections of owl pellets in Columbia County, Washington. International Journal of Osteoarchaeology, 13(3), 150-156.
- McGovern, T., et al. (2008) "NABONE Zooarchaeological Database: Recording System Codes."
- Swift, J. A., Miller, M. J., & Kirch, P. V. (2017). Stable isotope analysis of Pacific rat (Rattus exulans) from archaeological sites in Mangareva (French Polynesia): The use of commensal species for understanding human activity and ecosystem change. Environmental Archaeology, 22(3), 283-297.
- Weissbrod, L. et al. (2017) "Origins of house mice in ecological niches created by settled hunter-gatherers in the Levant 15,000 y ago." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 114.16. 4099-4104.
- https://www.nhbs.com/blog/uk-small-mammal-identification
Contact
- Alex FitzpatrickTwitter: @archaeologyfitz
- Simona FalangaTwitter: @CrazyBoneLady
- Alex’s Blog: Animal Archaeology
- Music "Coconut - (dyalla remix)" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2UiKoouqaY
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Transcript
Introduction to the Podcast and Episode 55
00:00:00
Speaker
You're listening to the Archaeology Podcast Network.
Focus on Zooarchaeology of Small Mammals
00:00:12
Speaker
Hello everyone, and welcome to episode 55 of Archaeo Animals, the show about zoo archaeology with me, Simona Falanga, and... I'm Alex Fitzpatrick. And in this episode we're going to talk about Mice and Rats, the zoo archaeology of very small mammals. And now, on with the show.
Defining 'Very Small Mammals' in Zooarchaeology
00:00:35
Speaker
Hi again everyone, on today's episode we're looking at yet another group of terrifying animals, the zoarchaeologists that are just looking to have a nice and easy time doing an animal bone report. But they're very dreaded.
00:00:49
Speaker
very small mammals. Bonus points for the amount of berry you can shove in a sentence. But what do we actually mean by very small mammals? It depends who you ask, is the answer. So normally, as a zoarchaeologist, if you can't identify an animal or two species, you tend to assign it to a size category to just, you know, give an indicator of size. So for example, say you get a fragment of a shaft of something, you know, could be a horse, could be a cow,
00:01:16
Speaker
More often than not, they will go down as unidentified large mammal. Which brings us to the question, what does a very small mammal entail? This, in a way, can be subjective because, you know, what is small?
Standardization Challenges in Small Mammal Classification
00:01:31
Speaker
For instance, the North Atlantic Biocultural Organizations recording system defines very small terrestrial mammals as anything mouse of full-sized.
00:01:41
Speaker
Historic England, on the other hand, in the Random Bone Guide, use the terminology microfauna, which refers to all small vertebrates, which will include reptiles, amphibians, and all small mammals, the sort of squirrel size and smaller, as well as fish and bird. So now for the purpose of this episode, by very small mammal, Alex and I will henceforth mean anything rat sized or smaller. Yeah, so it's that weird problem. And I think
00:02:10
Speaker
Zoo archaeologists have been having this kind of discussion for a pretty long time now, but there's not really a standardization in zoo archaeology, particularly for things like this. So I have mainly worked in the North Atlantic and North Atlantic sites, so we usually use NABONE.
00:02:31
Speaker
So for me, you know, I've always used STM, so small terrestrial mammals, VSTM, very small terrestrial mammals. That's always been kind of how I've approached it. But obviously, especially nowadays, I've worked with lots of others who are archaeologists and met a lot of others who are archaeologists and, you know, everyone kind of uses
00:02:50
Speaker
their own thing.
Methodology and Reporting on Size Categories
00:02:51
Speaker
I mean, it's never like too drastically different, but if you don't really know the kind of context and you read something that says, again, like very small terrestrial mammal, you know, that could be a squirrel, that could be a vole, it really depends. I mean, Simona, what's your kind of experience with stuff like this?
00:03:12
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, it does tend to be quite variable, but I think it's not the end of the world because normally sort of when you do have size identifiers or size categories is something you're normally including your methodology anyway.
00:03:24
Speaker
So hopefully you should get a key of some description if you're reading a report of what the author actually means by sort of small mammal, large mammal. Tristan has a question. What happens if the size isn't what you expect? What do you do with rodents of unusual size? I knew this was going to happen.
00:03:48
Speaker
Might as well get rid of the start of the episode, okay? I just want to know about some unusual size. Define unusual size. Unusual. Not usual. In Princess Bride, they're like dog sized, right?
00:04:06
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, no, they are. They're really big. They're kind of like capybara size, I would say. But this highlights the issues, doesn't it? Like, you say dog size, I say capybara size. It's sometimes difficult to find a correct standard. I don't think there is a standard rat, is there? Well, yeah, I guess that's kind of it. Obviously, we do have
00:04:28
Speaker
somewhat biometrical standards. There's ways of which, you know, you can do measurements to kind of help with identification of things, but that's really
00:04:40
Speaker
kind of for the nitty gritty, I feel like.
Biometrical Standards and Identification Importance
00:04:42
Speaker
And even then, you know, you always work with a bit of error on both sides. It's, I mean, yeah, there's, there's reasons why we don't necessarily have like massive standardization because there's obviously variances, but on the other hand, you know, it might be nice to have some kind of standardization. It's, I guess it's the age-old debate into archeology that we don't really talk about because it's kind of boring. It's all about numbers and stuff. Who cares?
00:05:11
Speaker
With her, I guess the capybara, I'll probably put it safely in the medium-sized mammals. Yeah, I guess. Anyway, to get back on track.
00:05:22
Speaker
We're talking about anything rat-sized or smaller in this episode. And why are they important?
Significance of Small Mammals in Archaeology
00:05:28
Speaker
Why should we care about these teeny tiny little animals that frankly give us more discomfort than comfort as archaeologists? Because the bones are very tiny and very annoying in times. Well, they can be indicative of environment.
00:05:45
Speaker
They are often representative of commensal species. For example, they live among humans in a largely opportunistic manner, like eating their grain stores, but they're not entirely reliant on human activity to survive.
00:06:00
Speaker
So that teaches us a lot about the human activity that may have been happening at this particular site. And it sheds lights on introductions. We discussed in earlier episodes how several commensal rodents have accidentally been introduced to places over time. So they're pretty big transitionary species almost. They seem to come and go with pretty big
00:06:31
Speaker
events in history, whether that's, you know, a settlement being created or migration happening, you know, they're incredibly important indicator species.
Common Small Mammals in the UK
00:06:42
Speaker
So, what because Alex and myself mainly deal with British Zoo archaeology, what sort of various mammals do we find in Britain? Arguably, you know, mostly mice, rats, voles and then a variety of other small insectivores. In terms of mice, Britain has four different species.
00:07:02
Speaker
We have the wood, so-slash, field mouse, apodemus silvaticus, the house mouse, mus muscolus, the harvest mouse, micromis minutus, and the yellow-necked mouse, apodemus flamicomlis. Although in all fairness really, wood mouse and house mouse is most of what you'll be finding archaeologically.
00:07:22
Speaker
As for rats, Britain is home to two species, so you have the brown slash common rat, ratus norvegicus, which I believe is the latest addition to Britain to think came around the 1800s or 18th century.
00:07:36
Speaker
Yeah, mainly like on ships, but you know, like, as far as just the introduction of rats in general is concerned, it tends to be a bit of a unknown moment. And that was definitely the case for the brown rat. And the black rat, ratus ratus. Tums of voles, we have again,
00:07:53
Speaker
free species. You can imagine this is all a delight to look at from under archaeological conditions. The native species of vole are the bank vole, mi alles glareolus, the field vole, mi crotus agrestis, and the water vole, arvical amphibious. I wonder why it's called that.
00:08:12
Speaker
And of course, it's not just about the mice, the rats, and the voles. There are other small insectivore, aka insect-eating mammals, like shrews, of which there are three native to mainland Britain. So you have the common shrew, the pygmy shrew, and the water shrew.
Classification Debate on Hedgehogs
00:08:37
Speaker
And I guess, technically, we could probably include hedgehogs. We might be pushing it a bit, but... It's small enough. I'd put that as a very small mammal. Any natural solar pails, by the way. Yeah, they're pretty small. And, you know, frankly, when else are we going to be able to talk about them on this podcast, unless we do a whole hedgehog episode, which, again, you know, if people want it, we can do it.
00:09:05
Speaker
But yeah, I think that's a pretty good list of examples here in Britain. But of course, there are many, many other mammalian species out there that can be considered very small mammals, obviously. It's just, Britain, we have not literally a lack of diversity, but in comparison to other places, obviously, a bit wanting for small species.
00:09:28
Speaker
larger species, really. Just species. Yeah, I guess. I mean, so the other thing is obviously I was going to ask, you know, what is your experience with these tiny little creatures who are archaeologically or archaeologically? They're annoying. Just get it all out. Because I think from an osteological point of view, like,
00:09:53
Speaker
to be fair, of course, it's not something you'll be able to find hand excavating on site. I mean, like, you'd have to be like with your face in the ground for quite some time. So it's something that you probably more likely to recover through environmental soil samples.
Challenges in Identifying Small Mammal Remains
00:10:08
Speaker
But it's just one of those things like the
00:10:10
Speaker
they can like preserve well enough, but in terms of like anatomy, like comparing the anatomy between say the several different species of mouse and foal, it can be like incredibly difficult to identify even sort of complete elements to species. So I find more often than not, unless you have something like jaws or maxillas or a pelvis, it's tricky. Yeah, because obviously the
00:10:37
Speaker
maxillas and the mandibles, they're pretty, you know, characteristic of what you think of like a rodent or something. But they do get small. I mean, I think realistically, you're quite lucky if you're getting a lot in, you know, a soil sample or something. Even I think people kind of noticing it in the field, it really depends. And
00:11:05
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's it's a bit tricky. I think I've only really like once or twice. Maybe it's very few for sure. And obviously, you know, it is also dependent on the kind of sites you're working on. Although I will say.
00:11:20
Speaker
a shockingly small amount of rodents for someone who has worked in, say, cave sites and things like that, which obviously might speak for other kind of differences and things happening at those sites. But yeah, although I will say I have experienced voles because there's the Orkney vole, which I think we might talk about a bit later on this episode.
00:11:45
Speaker
And what I worked in the Orkney is they're very famous for just kind of always being around and you always had to be kind of careful, not when it came to excavating per se, but mostly when it came to setting up the camp, you know, for the site that we had.
00:12:00
Speaker
these big tents because it obviously poured all the time on site and we needed a place to put our stuff to kind of just unwind, have lunch without getting soaking wet. And when you would put those up and obviously push the poles down, you had to make sure you weren't, you know, accidentally gate-crashing a vole house, per se. So there were some unfortunate accidents, I feel like, with voles, but usually we were pretty good at making sure that we didn't disturb them too much.
00:12:31
Speaker
Yeah, going back sort of from like identification, I think probably jaws and maxillas are going to be the easiest of telltales sort of even between sort of the various mouse species. Like if you've got jaws or a maxilla or something, you should be able to tell the difference between sort of like the various species of mouse. If you get a humorous effect, I think that's where it gets a little trickier.
00:12:55
Speaker
one thing that like strikes me normally in particular is that with the balls sort of the not too sure how to describe it but like the if you look at the occlusal view of the jaw or the maxilla the tooth pattern looks like jagged or like very how you imagine a rodent to look like it's not that dissimilar from rabbits either but in mice the cusps when they're in wear they look like they're shaped like little love hearts
00:13:24
Speaker
So in your likely event that you come across a mouse jaw, please keep an eye out for the love hearts.
00:13:32
Speaker
Yeah, you know, speaking of their jaws and their teeth, I think realistically the most experience I have with kind of rodents in archaeology or in zoo archaeology is their gnawing. Like I probably write down and observe more like rodent gnawing than I do the actual rodent bones, which obviously makes sense, especially because a lot of gnawing could potentially be more
00:13:56
Speaker
modern and contemporary, but yeah. Otherwise, not that much experience with kind of looking at big volumes of small mammalian bone like that.
Impact of Rodent Remains on Archaeological Sites
00:14:09
Speaker
which actually reminds me one thing that's probably worth mentioning as well, because yes, we did discuss that there's very small mammals, and especially mice and rats, they can be indicative of introductions and the relationship they had alongside humans, or if they were in or around a settlement. But of course, what I forgot to mention is that it's all provided, they're not intrusive, because I should expect mice and rats like to burrow.
00:14:38
Speaker
So you do get rodent remains and indeed the holes that they've left behind basically trashing through archaeology and the rodent remains are probably not that old at all. They just ended up in your ditch. So there's that just to make it fun.
00:14:54
Speaker
So yeah, you know, what a wonderful, fun time rodents are in archaeology. And we'll take a quick break and when we come back, we will talk a bit more about very small mammals, not just in Britain, but around the world.
Case Studies: Small Mammals as Environmental Indicators
00:15:14
Speaker
And we are back on episode 55 of Archaeo-Animals of the Zoo Archaeology of Very Small Mammals. In the first part, we've discussed of what a very small mammal entails. So I thought we'd take a look at some examples from around the world. And first on our list is the African pygmy mouse, Mus minutoidus.
00:15:34
Speaker
which is one of the smallest rodent species in the world and it's mainly found what in most parts of Africa really was so the exception of northern Africa and it is arguably the textbook definition of very small mammals as adults usually only grow to about one to three inches long. Now like many other micro mammals the African pygmy mouse is particularly valued amongst biologists and zoarchaeologists alike for their use in reconstructing paleo environments
00:16:04
Speaker
but these mice are also particularly useful for understanding the development and spread of pastoralism in Africa. Have you looked at a picture, Simona, of the African pygmy mouse? Because it is so cute. I don't want to. Oh, okay. I think I might have a cuteness overload and then we'll be unable to talk about any other species.
00:16:31
Speaker
You know what? That's fair. But it's an interesting kind of case study of, you know, we talk a lot in previous episodes, and we are talking about in this episode, the kind of importance of these small, very small, sorry, very small mammals for their kind of
00:16:50
Speaker
ability, not really their ability, but the characteristics that are associated with them that are utilized for a lot of other things in archaeology, you know, environmental reconstruction, things like that, that we talked about in the first part. But obviously, you know, they're still very important in modern day as well, because of those very same characteristics. And I mean, I don't know if we've really talked about applied to archaeology,
00:17:18
Speaker
in this show, but I think we might have an episode lined up at some point about it. But applied zookeology is basically the concept of utilizing zookeology, so past data of animal populations and our understanding of past species interactions and things like that, and applying it to more contemporary
00:17:44
Speaker
scientific kind of investigation. I think we have mentioned it on a fair few occasions. I think it was more as case studies, but how the way in which the archaeologist has been applied for conservation, but also I think we did some case studies and discussions with regards to sheep in particular, and how it's been used for more sheep. We're not necessarily sheep husbandry, but yeah.
00:18:09
Speaker
Yeah, no, it's coming back to the rate. It's been a while folks, it's fit about. But yeah, just as a refresher then. So that's what applies to archaeology is, and it's nice to kind of see the way those two interact. Moving on, we have the rice field rat.
00:18:33
Speaker
Now it's found throughout Southeast Asia, unsurprisingly among rice fields, where it's often considered a pest.
00:18:42
Speaker
Now, because it's associated primarily with rice fields, it's particularly useful among other rice field pests for examining the spread of rice farming throughout Asia. So obviously, the more rice field rats you find at the site, the more likely it is that, hey, there may have been rice farming going on. And you can kind of trace that throughout by combining and comparing a lot of the data from various sites across the Asian continent.
00:19:12
Speaker
Now, archaeological excavation in Southeast Asia has also revealed historic instances of rice field rat consumption. Although it doesn't seem to have been a staple of any diet, they still may have been consumed occasionally. So, a lot of different kind of utilizations for the rice field rats. Next up, as promised, is the Humboldt Oknevo Mikroto Sarvalis Orcadensis.
00:19:42
Speaker
which is, well, it's a vole, everyone, which lives in the Orkney Islands. More specifically, they're a population of the common vole, so Mikrotus arbalis. I guess because you have the Orkadensis at the end, it would classify maybe as a subspecies almost. I don't know whether they differ enough from the common vole to have speciated.
00:20:08
Speaker
The thing about the Orkney vole is that it's 10% larger than the common vole.
00:20:16
Speaker
that's filed goes something that you'd expect, you know, if you look like especially like in in the Pleistocene, you do tend to find this trend, where sort of the microfauna tends to be a lot bigger on islands, and vice versa. But it's not, well, it's probably not the same thing, because it's not a change that you expect to happen in such a short amount of time. So I mean, the
00:20:39
Speaker
like the oldest Oklaevol remains uncovered were about 4,600 years old. Archaeological research has suggested that the Oklaevol was introduced by humans during the Neolithic, again, as a bit of an unknown moment. I wouldn't expect that much of a change to happen in such what is in the grand scheme of things, such a short amount of time.
00:21:04
Speaker
Yeah, it's so there's a lot of things strange. So obviously, they're 10% larger than the common vole. And you know, the common vole themselves are strangely absent in the rest of Britain. So you mean the Orkney vole? No, I think it's the common vole I thought was actually absent in most of Britain. Oh, well, the common is in the field vole. Yeah, you do get vole. Yeah, well, then I cannot read.
00:21:33
Speaker
Because yeah, the Orkney Bowl is probably just confined to the Orkney Islands and you don't really find them elsewhere. Yeah, yeah. It's very strange though. That's why I was so confused. It's a very weird thing, even without that. This is just me with the scrolls all over again, folks. That's okay. You've been replaced by the new to reptiles of Britain. True, yes. This is true.
00:22:02
Speaker
Anyway, in addition, research comparing the Orkney vole from other common vole have also shown the way humans are able to influence and change species on a morphological and as well as a evolutionary level. So Orkney voles are even more different than the common vole brethren.
00:22:24
Speaker
based in their dental characteristics. So as they spread across the various northern aisles, they differ in their tooth shape, I believe. It's very, very nitty-gritty type things that, frankly, if you're not looking for it, I think a lot of zorarchaeologists, especially people like me who kind of just do general zorarchaeology and kind of deal with a lot of different species, would definitely not pick up. But it's really interesting. And, you know, as Simona says,
00:22:53
Speaker
And we have talked about this in previous episodes, like the kind of island effect on species. It's, it's, it's weird. It's definitely weird, but yeah. I tell you what, they've done this to spiders. It's like, I tell you what we're going to do over millennia. We're going to change our tooth morphology ever so slightly just to throw people off. We're going to look at our bones 5,000 years from now. That's what's happened.
00:23:24
Speaker
Sorry. Yeah, like, they're not difficult enough, really, to deal with. Also, did we mention that they were most likely introduced within animal food? Oh, the island. Yeah, so as people moved around, obviously, especially during the Alephic, people are settling. They've realized that they can domesticate species, and to do that, they have to keep them fed.
00:23:52
Speaker
voles, just like other rodents, love to tag along. Again, it's a very interesting thing about these very small mammalian species. They are difficult to kind of pick up if you're kind of just generally looking at an animal.
Dual Role of Small Mammals in Archaeology
00:24:09
Speaker
Bones or even just excavating can be generally hard to pick up and retrieve.
00:24:14
Speaker
They can be very frustrating for us, but they are kind of the harbingers of massive change sometimes, whether that's people moving to different places, people settling somewhere new, creating a new community. It's really interesting how kind of important their presence is, at least with regards to what they may or may not indicate. But they're also really annoying, so.
00:24:44
Speaker
It's hard. Should we move on to an acute small mammal? Yes. Potentially less annoying, because again, I think this is one that I've definitely never seen in my excavations. No, I think it's more of a taciturn silent presence.
00:25:09
Speaker
to keep to himself. It's the hedgehog. It's the European hedgehog. Erinacci or so it appeals. I mean, it's an insectivore, even though technically it's a bit more of an omnivore. Loves dog food. Probably still did back in the day. And that's some shared ancestry with shrews. To be fair, I can see that because their muzzle is sort of quite
00:25:31
Speaker
elongated quite pointy and you know if you picture a shrew or if you want to like look at something really cute you look up a pygmy shrew as well the cutest thing you'll ever see so now i can see how they have some shared ancestry and now during the middle ages they were sometimes used for food and there there are actually instances of recipes that call for hedgehog as you do another species of hedgehog across the world have been used for medicine and witchcraft
00:26:00
Speaker
Although, arguably, is it a very small mammal? To be fair, I would say it is, mainly, because sometimes you get some older males, that absolute unit of a hedgehog. But all in all, I'd probably still put them in the very small mammal camp myself. And the humble hedgehog has been used by archaeologists to examine human mobility, given that it has actually been introduced elsewhere.
00:26:24
Speaker
probably also inadvertently. So, for example, hedgehogs have been found on the island of Gotland among pitted-wear culture assemblages which they back to the middle Neolithic. AD&A work on the remains has shown that these hedgehogs actually originated from Sweden, so likely indicating human contact between Gotland and the mainland during the Neolithic. So yet again another species that whoops and we're here now.
00:26:51
Speaker
Even though I can also picture someone going, this is cute, I'm taking it with me. Well, yeah, that's the thing, isn't it? It's, you know, most likely that they just kind of tagged along because, you know, that's what they do and they still do today. But I guess maybe there's like maybe a 0.2% chance someone was just like,
00:27:15
Speaker
things cute. I mean, we do it today too. People love to kind of just take random animals and try to make them pets. So who knows?
00:27:26
Speaker
do. I don't know if you can in this country, I think you can. Is the African pygmy shrew the one that is, I think, well, not regularly, because I think it's probably the most common of pets, but it's the one that you most often see being kept as a pet, as opposed to a full European hedgehog.
00:27:47
Speaker
But, you know, people do find them cute. Quite a fair few, like, people in the UK do, like, tend to hedgehogs, and they'll go, like, you can buy hedgehog-specific food from pet shops, and you can feed the hedgehogs in your garden and encourage them. Also, because they're quite helpful, because they get rid of a lot of your pests, a lot of the slugs and things. Not only they cause absolutely no damage to you and will never enter and nest in your home, but will also help you get rid of, yeah, the other pests that you may not want.
00:28:16
Speaker
It's a win-win really, and they're super cute. Yeah, and I feel like, and this is me kind of thinking off the top of my head, I think there are some really cute hedgehog artifacts that you can look up and find. I think the Met, so the Metropolis Museum of Art in New York, I believe they had some hedgehog shaped
00:28:41
Speaker
like, amulets and stuff from Egypt. This is something I vaguely remember from my undergraduate, so not only are they really interesting in this kind of...
00:28:51
Speaker
osteological perspective, but they are just kind of a thing that you could find in artifacts, which is also extremely cute. So yeah, if you want to have a fun time, you can look it up. Oh, I just remembered, it's, there's an artifact from the Middle East, I think, somewhere. It's a hedgehog and it's like on wheels. I remember that going around social media.
00:29:18
Speaker
a hedgehog on wheels. Yeah, it's like a little hedgehog, like carved out of something. Looks, I think it's like ivory or something maybe. And it's like on this little, like, cart. Oh, that's nice. And of course, let's not forget the hedgehogs that you find in some of the medieval beastiaries. Yes, of course, they're priceless. Real accurate depictions of hedgehogs there. But to be fair, like just medieval beastiaries in general, that they're a mood.
00:29:46
Speaker
I think we have an episode that we'll do at some point in the near future about beast cherries. I hope so. I think it should probably make a distinction between medieval beast cherries and medieval maps, because I think for both of those things, you could do a ten-parter. Just the imagined zoo archeology of what they thought a rabbit looked like.
00:30:08
Speaker
And also all the creatures of medieval maps, especially the further you went away from Western Europe, the more they'd just come up with the wildest stuff. They're like, oh yeah, there's this creature here. Yeah, sure. Sure. Anyway, as we think about the fanciful, I guess we will take a break and we will come back to something a bit more grounded in reality with our case studies.
House Mice Case Study in the Levant
00:30:36
Speaker
And we are back with episode 55 of Archaeo Animals, the podcast all about zookeology. And we are talking about very small mammals, mice, rats and all other kinds of tiny little creatures. And it is the, you know, I don't have to do this every episode, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Very, very exciting. Everyone loves it. Case studies.
00:31:02
Speaker
So yeah, we actually have three case studies this time around. Just so excited for case studies, I guess. So we're going to start with house mice in the Levant. So just a quick refresher, if you don't know, the Levant refers to a historical region in Western Asia that borders the Eastern Mediterranean.
00:31:24
Speaker
It is also, potentially, the site from which the house mouse was able to expand globally. So they may have kind of started around here, and they began to travel what human groups as they moved and eventually settled elsewhere, and thus were able to kind of spread throughout the world. As such, Levantine sites are pretty ripe for zoarchaeology studies of the development of commensalism,
00:31:53
Speaker
aka a relationship between two species in which one benefits from the other without harming or benefiting them. And this relationship was between, of course, house mice and humans. So the earliest commensal niche for house mice appears to have been about 15,000 years ago, give or take.
00:32:15
Speaker
when humans were settling into kind of more long-term settlements. So they weren't necessarily at the stage of agriculture, but they were definitely settling down into one particular place, but still kind of foraging.
00:32:35
Speaker
So yeah, prior to farming. So research using both archeological and contemporary data of house mice has shown that commensal mice ultimately have the competitive advantage over time as more and more human groups settled permanently. So basically mice that were taking advantage of humans as they settled, so going through their food, picking up some grains,
00:33:04
Speaker
getting all those benefits from being around humans without actually harming them, they had a competitive advantage against the mice that weren't necessarily doing that. They were kind of just chilling, doing their own thing somewhere else. However, this isn't just a straightforward thing. It has historically fluctuated as well.
00:33:25
Speaker
So certain sites that represented more mobile groups that traveled seasonably. So human groups that may have camped in one area for prime foraging season or because of a certain species that was around that they could hunt and then would camp elsewhere when that season was over.
00:33:49
Speaker
They had less commensal wild mice that would outcompete their more commensal brethren. So obviously because they weren't permanently settled places, you didn't really need to have that relationship to kind of benefit from them.
00:34:07
Speaker
So yeah, it showcases, well, sorry, short, it showcases that kind of relationship between permanent settlements and the kind of benefits that house mice would get by being nearby them. And obviously, as people began to settle more and more, we get to see more of that relationship build up and basically become kind of more prevalent amongst house mice. I mean, like, why go search for your own food where you can go raid these humans' grain store?
00:34:35
Speaker
I mean, it's kind of the lesson of agriculture as well. Not necessarily that we were raiding, I guess in some ways we were raiding earth, but we were growing and, you know, caring for earth. So it's not that bad. I'm just digging myself into a hole. Similar to what I think mice and rats often do. You're burrowing. Burrowing.
Pacific Rat and Environmental Studies
00:34:56
Speaker
For our second case study, we have the Pacific Rat in Mangareva. The Mangareva is the largest of the Grandier Islands, located in French Polynesia. It's also an interesting site to examine human-inductive change and transformation to the surrounding environment and ecosystem, particularly due to predation, loss of habitat, competition, and the number of introduced species. Unsurprisingly, one of the best species to utilize in this sort of investigation are the small rodents, or not-so-small rodents, I guess.
00:35:25
Speaker
like, in this case, the Pacific rat, Ratus exolans, also known as the Polynesian rat, the Little rat, or the Kyurei. Like the previously discussed house mouse, the Pacific rat has developed a commensal relationship with humans. But it is also a great example of an introduced species as well, because why would you introduce a rat voluntarily? Let's face it. Well, the Pacific rat can't swim very far.
00:35:50
Speaker
meaning that its appearance on various islands is most likely due to human intervention, whether this is intentional or otherwise, I mean, most likely the latter. Within various sites in Mangareva, the Pacific rat remains have been used in stabilized stove analysis to understand the changes in the food webs of the island. Now, because the rat has such a limited range of mobility and is not terribly selective in what it eats, just a big mood in itself,
00:36:19
Speaker
It makes a particularly good indicator of what is and isn't available for an omnivore species that will literally chomp on anything. This particular research indicated an overall trend of decreasing nitrogen values in the Pacific rat remains, which has been attributed to a decline in seabird population, as there's very little evidence for fishing or hunting marine mammals, which in itself is likely due to human activity as well.
00:36:45
Speaker
So again, another very good example of how you can use sort of very small mammals and rodents in this particular case, to not only track, get an idea of what the environment was like, what sort of species and food sources were available. You can also learn more about some of their interactions with humans, which also includes the very introduction of the species. So that's very, yeah, textbook example, really.
00:37:10
Speaker
I believe we've actually talked about the Pacific rat in the past. I think so. We've probably mentioned it because if people are interested way, way, way back in the depths of our catalogue, we have an entire episode on introductions of alien species where the rat would, as you presume, feature prominently.
00:37:35
Speaker
for sure and it's also another thing is that it's it's interesting to use utilize the rat or you know again any of these kind of small mammals that kind of have this relationship with humans it's interesting how they are pretty important if we're also looking at say
00:37:55
Speaker
settlements that may have very little presence left. Obviously, a lot of these cases and a lot of these sites, there's a lot of other examples or evidence of human activity, whether that's human remains being there, bits of buildings, or other kind of artifacts. But, you know, there could be places that there really isn't that kind of evidence. So,
00:38:24
Speaker
There's some kind of utilization or potential for utilization there of if you have a high concentration of small rodents or things like that, although should also point out, and this is something we'll get into in our final case study, it's not just humans that seem to
00:38:45
Speaker
accidentally collect rodents and small mammals. There are some other creatures that may, you know, accumulate these kind of remains over time.
Owl Pellet Analysis in Washington
00:38:58
Speaker
And I guess that brings us to the deer mice and montane vole in Washington, USA. So this is a different sort of a case study.
00:39:09
Speaker
It's not an example of an archaeological site or anything. It's actually a contemporary experiment to judge the effectiveness of using small mammal remains as indicators for environmental change. So, zoarchaeologists collected owl pellets from
00:39:27
Speaker
1999 to 2001 from an equipment shed in central Columbia County, Washington, USA. I'm just going to take a real quick sidebar. Simona, did you ever dissect owl pellets in school? No, no. Have you? Is this an American thing?
00:39:49
Speaker
just thinking like, no, in general, like I've never dissected an owl pellet, or least of all in school, because we never did anything as practical as that. Yeah, we can't remember what grade it was. But yeah, we dissected owl pellets, we didn't do as much of the kind of stereotypical dissections that you see in like,
00:40:12
Speaker
media, you know, the frog thing or things like that. We did dissect things. Most of them were kind of bits and pieces of animals. I think we did, we did a worm. We also did like a cow eye and like some other kind of organs, but we also did an owl pellet to kind of look at the bones and stuff. And I think that kind of helped me get into the place I am now when it comes to
00:40:36
Speaker
being a zooarchaeologist. So thanks a lot to my middle school science teachers, I guess. But yeah, anyway, so if you don't know, owls, when they, when they digest and let loose the remains of their male, they are in the form of owl pellets. If you break them apart, you can most often see bits and pieces of things that kind of went down the digestive tract. So
00:41:01
Speaker
A lot of times it can be bone, well not really down the digestive tract, but what they, what's left over kind of. So yeah, it could be bones, it could be hair, bits of feathers, all the kind of fun stuff of things that they eat. Anyway, Zuar'gael just would collect these owl pellets.
00:41:20
Speaker
And during the time that they're collecting all these owl pellets, the nearby habitat went through a very distinctive change. So it went from producing only wheat fields to producing both wheat and grass fields. So prior to this change, owl pellets indicated much more deer mice. Thank you. Then montane vowel.
00:41:44
Speaker
Val vol. Microtos montados. Really creating new pronunciations, new realities. This is a real special episode. But yeah, so we had more deer mice than mountain vol. However, after this environmental change, so after the habitat nearby began to produce both wheat and grass fields, there was actually much more vol than mice observed in the owl pellets. So these observations reflect similar changes in rodents.
00:42:14
Speaker
that we see kind of more generally in archaeology due to change in agricultural practices and vegetation changes. However, you know, there's also the chance that there are changes in predation behavior and prey availability that's happening at the same time. So overall,
00:42:34
Speaker
The zoo archaeologists have concluded that when you are using rodents as indicators of habitat change, you should probably add a couple other lines of evidence to solidify these interpretations. So, you know,
00:42:51
Speaker
It's a pretty strong indication, but what helps more is to have, you know, maybe a couple other evidence to back that up, which I think goes for basically any kind of interpretation you provide as an archaeologist. And this is something that as a unexpectedly also ruined my day in a way, because even though I'm well aware of owl pellets, it just, you know, like, you know, when the light bulb goes on,
00:43:15
Speaker
And you say you have your ditch and at the bottom of your ditch there's a collection of remains of various rodents. So is that indicative of settlement or has an owl just ejected the rest of his meal into your ditch? Yeah. I mean, if it's not intrusive, then it's still like a 2000 year old owl pellet. Yay. I mean, they're not, you know, they're all dried up and they're not that bad to go through. I actually really enjoyed going like dissecting them as a child.
00:43:44
Speaker
not like I've heard it's not too, it's not too gross. But just thinking how like, yeah, like maybe finding rodent remains in certain contexts, it's not necessarily indicative of settlement, it's just something completely extraneous to the settlement. And it's just an owl happens to have defecated near the settlement.
00:44:02
Speaker
So yeah, that is, I guess, unless if, do you have anything else to add? Anything else you'd like to bring up about our small micro fauna? I think my last sentence was a very fitting ending to this. A very distinguished ending to a very fascinating topic, which is curse those owl pellets. They are ruining our archaeological interpretations.
00:44:34
Speaker
Thanks for nothing, Owls. Yeah, I mean, at the end of the day, these, a lot of our archaeological sites are ultimately part of nature.
Natural Challenges in Archaeology
00:44:43
Speaker
And that means we have to deal with all of that entails, whether that's working in the worst weather conditions you could possibly imagine, or dealing with people just, and by people, of course, I mean burrowing animals and regurgitating animals, kind of just wrecking all of our stratigraphy as much as possible.
00:45:03
Speaker
We can't just have a clean-cut, kind of completely in-context site, can we? Too much to ask for. Too easy. But yeah, I guess that wraps things up for this episode. As always, we are on Twitter at archaeoanimals.
00:45:23
Speaker
Let us know what you think of these episodes. Let us know if you have any episode requests. We've actually got some recently, so that's exciting. And we will try and do our best to work with those requests. And, you know, it's great to know that people are listening. And if you are listening, feel free to leave us reviews and like our podcasts on the various podcasting
00:45:49
Speaker
apps, I don't know what the word is, wherever you get your podcasts, you'll find us. Tell your friends about us. And yeah, I guess we will see you next time on Arceo animals. Bye.
00:46:09
Speaker
Thank you for listening to RQ animals. Please subscribe and rate the podcast wherever you get your podcasts from. You can find us on Twitter at RQ animals. Also, the views expressed on the podcast are those of ourselves, the hosts and guests, and do not necessarily represent those of our institution, employers, and the RQLJ podcast network. Thanks for listening.
00:46:35
Speaker
This episode was produced by Chris Webster from his RV traveling the United States, Tristan Boyle in Scotland, DigTech LLC, Culturo Media, and the Archaeology Podcast Network, and was edited by Laura Johnson. This has been a presentation of the Archaeology Podcast Network. Visit us on the web for show notes and other podcasts at www.archpodnet.com. Contact us at chris at archaeologypodcastnetwork.com.