Evolution: life in the Tarantian Age (late Pleistocene, Cenozoic)

'Walking with Beasts' is a dramatization of life in the Cenozoic, focused mainly on the evolution of mammals. "Broadcast in 2001, it told the story of life on Earth from the death of the dinosaurs to the dawn of the age of man" (BBC, 2001¹). The sixth episode ('Mammoth Journey') is centered on the Tarantian Age. (See also Wikipedia, 2011².)

Time: Tarantian Age (30 thousand years ago), late Pleistocene Epoch, in the Cenozoic Era.
Setting: the North Sea during the last Ice Age, during the seasonal migration of animals to the Swiss Alps and back.
Main species featured in the episode:

Woolly mammoth, an ancestral relative of elephants, yet a genus nowadays extinct.
Megaloceros, a giant deer, an ancestor of modern deers.
European lion, an ancestor of modern lions.
Woolly rhinoceros, an ancestral relative of modern rhinoceros, yet a genus nowadays extinct.
Cro-Magnon (identified as human), an ancestor of modern humans.
Neanderthal, an ancestral relative of modern humans, yet a genus nowadays extinct.


(Video 1/2 embedded from YouTube on 26 October 2011)	(Video 2/2 embedded from YouTube on 26 October 2011)

Editor

Jose D PEREZGONZALEZ (2011). Massey University, Turitea Campus, Private Bag 11-222, Palmerston North 4442, New Zealand. (JDPerezgonzalez).

Want to know more?

'Walking with beasts' TV series: Both the BBC, in the UK, and ABC, in Australia, offer more information about the making of the series.
Wikipedia - Geologic history of Earth: The following Wikipedia pages offer more information about the Tarantian Age, the Pleistocene Epoch, and the Cenozoic Era.
Wikipedia - Walking with beasts: This Wikipedia page offers more information about the series and companion book.