Adventive Vertebrates and Historical Ecology in the Pre-Columbian Neotropics

Abstract

The arrival of Europeans in the Western Hemisphere (ca. AD 1500) is generally used as a convenient reference point for signaling the early appearance of invasive faunas. Although use of this date embraces an implicit belief in benign landscape management by pre-Columbian inhabitants of the Americas, substantial evidence for the anthropogenic movement of domesticated, wild, and synanthropic vertebrates throughout the Neotropics suggests that it may be an exaggerated and erroneous reference point for the aims of ecological restoration and biological conservation.

Keywords

• invasive fauna
• Neotropics
• historical ecology
• archaeology
• zooarchaeology
• ecological restoration
• conservation biology
• prehistoric Indians