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Recent vertebrate carcasses and their paleobiological implications
TREE
vol.
5, no. 5, May
1990
rather, it involves such agents as microbial insecticides, e.g. virus preparations against pine sawflies. The chapter on insecticides is an object lesson to us all. It dwells on the history of insecticide use, and on the difficulties encountered when applying them in forest environments; and it highlights the follies of a wholly chemical approach to control. This naturally leads on to the monitoring of forest insects, and descriptions of several monitoring schemes are provided. The concluding chapter on integrated pest management triumphantly pulls the book together, although only five working examples are given. Some coloured plates would have been very useful; despite this shortcoming, the book should prove in-
valuable to students of applied entomology and forestry, providing a ready source of a wealth of easily assimilable information. It deserves a place on the shelves of all practising pure and applied entomologists, if only to remind them of the importance of forest insects.
Blackwell Scientific Publications 3 Varley, G.C., Gradwell, G.R. and Hassell] M.P. (1973) insect Population Ecoloav, Blackwell Scientific Publications 4 Christal, R.N. (1937) Insects of the British Woodlands, Frederick Warne &
co 5 Barbosa, P. and Wagner, M.R. (1989) Introduction to Forest and Shade Tree Insects, Academic Press
6 Lawton, J.H. and McNeill, S. (1979) in Population Dynamics (Anderson, R.M., Turner, B.D. and Taylor, L.R., eds), pp. Blackwell Scientific ForesbY Commission, Northern Research Station, 223-244, Publications Roslin, Midlothian EH25 9SY, UK 7 Haukioja, E. and Neuvonen, S. (1987) in insect Outbreaks (Barbosa, P. and
Simon R. Leather
References 1 Barbosa, P. and Schultz, J.C., eds (1987) insect Outbreaks, Academic Press 2 Strong, D.R., Lawton, J.H. and Southwood, R. (1984) insects on Plants,
Schultz, J.C., eds), pp. 41 l-432, Academic Press 8 Watt, A.D. (1986) Oecologia 70, 578-579 9 Dixon, 165-179
A.F.G.
(1971)
J. Appl. Ecol. 8,
The Way of All Flesh Recent VertebrateCarcasses and their Paleobiological Implications by Johannes Weigelt (transl. by Judith University of Chicago Schaefer), Press, 7989. $68.95/f47.95 hbk, $22.95/f15.95 pbk (xii + 188 pages) ISBN
0 226 88167
9
Death and its aftermath: this is the title of the first chapter of the longawaited translation of Weigelt’s classic work (originally published in 1927) on taphonomy, and perhaps no other statement can capture the essence of this work better. Weigelt’s descriptions of decaying carcasses, with putrefied flesh decomposing into foul-smelling fluids, are not for the weak of stomach. Many of these descriptions, in fact, would shame some of the scriptwriters of today’s horror movie genre. The first several chapters deal with anecdotal accounts of death, first as a process leading to decay, then in its various forms as a mode of introducing specimens into the fossil record, and finally as a means for interpreting skeletal remains within the fossil record. The most interesting chapters, arguably, are the later ones, which record the detailed observations of a mass death assemblage of vertebrates on the coastal plain of southeast Texas - the result of a severe winter cold spell following an extended period of drought - in the mid-1920s. These observations are subsequently put in perspective for interpreting mass deaths in the fossil record. To accompany the written observations, there are ample photographs and illustrations of carcasses
of different taxa, such as cattle, crocodiles, turtles and gars, all in various stages of decomposition. It is this mass of empirical data, collected by Weigelt, that provides the strength of this work, since few scientists today have recorded in a similar manner the details of death and decay. These data should prove to be extremely useful to taphonomists now working in terrestrial and marine deposits. A classic work can be viewed as one that is as relevant now as when it was written, and such is the case for this book. Indeed, Weigelt’s work represents the first major publication on taphonomy, even pre-dating the formal coining of the name of the field in 1940 by Efremov’. Weigelt clearly established a German tradition in the subject that influenced later German taphonomists, even though the volume was apparently largely overlooked by most current workers in the field. Heavily emphasized throughout the book is the importance of anas‘ trophic events’, which Wiegelt defined as’that occasional natural event that wipes out large portions of the animal world and depending on its frequency, regulates the propagation of species and displaces biotic communities’ (p. 121). With this definition there seems to be little need for the term; the effect is essentially the same as that of a catastrophic event. At the time Weigelt was writing, catastrophes (or anastrophes) were receiving very little scientific attention. Such punctuated or episodic events, Weigelt argued, are significant in the formation of major bone beds. There
is little doubt that this is true in one type of bone bed, but modern taphonomic thinking also recognizes the potential of time-averaging in the formation of bone beds2a3. It is now generally agreed that bone beds have the potential to encompass a biotic record that spans an extended interval of many years, and to preserve taxa that were not contemporaneous. Clearly, time-averaging is a significant phenomenon if one is attempting the transition from a taphonomic interpretation to a paleoecological interpretation of a bone assemblage, and presents quite different grounds from the catastrophe viewpoint for interpreting a particular bone bed. Overall, this volume, which has been largely inaccessible for so long, isexceedinglyvaluabletothoseinterested in the processes of death that can affecttheformation of bone beds. Judith Schaefer is to be commended for her efforts in the translation of this book, with the aid of Hans-Dieter Sues, and for bringing this important work to the forefront of taphonomy again.
Anthony R. Fiorillo Section of Vertebrate Fossils, The Carnegie Museum of Natural History, 4400 Forbes Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA
References 1 Efremov, LA. (1940)
Pan-Am. Geol. 74, 81-93 2 Behrensmever, A.K. (1982) Paleobiology 8, 21 l-227 3 Fiorillo. A.R. (1988) Curr. Res. Pleistocene 5, 103-I 09
vol.
5, no. 5, May
1990
rather, it involves such agents as microbial insecticides, e.g. virus preparations against pine sawflies. The chapter on insecticides is an object lesson to us all. It dwells on the history of insecticide use, and on the difficulties encountered when applying them in forest environments; and it highlights the follies of a wholly chemical approach to control. This naturally leads on to the monitoring of forest insects, and descriptions of several monitoring schemes are provided. The concluding chapter on integrated pest management triumphantly pulls the book together, although only five working examples are given. Some coloured plates would have been very useful; despite this shortcoming, the book should prove in-
valuable to students of applied entomology and forestry, providing a ready source of a wealth of easily assimilable information. It deserves a place on the shelves of all practising pure and applied entomologists, if only to remind them of the importance of forest insects.
Blackwell Scientific Publications 3 Varley, G.C., Gradwell, G.R. and Hassell] M.P. (1973) insect Population Ecoloav, Blackwell Scientific Publications 4 Christal, R.N. (1937) Insects of the British Woodlands, Frederick Warne &
co 5 Barbosa, P. and Wagner, M.R. (1989) Introduction to Forest and Shade Tree Insects, Academic Press
6 Lawton, J.H. and McNeill, S. (1979) in Population Dynamics (Anderson, R.M., Turner, B.D. and Taylor, L.R., eds), pp. Blackwell Scientific ForesbY Commission, Northern Research Station, 223-244, Publications Roslin, Midlothian EH25 9SY, UK 7 Haukioja, E. and Neuvonen, S. (1987) in insect Outbreaks (Barbosa, P. and
Simon R. Leather
References 1 Barbosa, P. and Schultz, J.C., eds (1987) insect Outbreaks, Academic Press 2 Strong, D.R., Lawton, J.H. and Southwood, R. (1984) insects on Plants,
Schultz, J.C., eds), pp. 41 l-432, Academic Press 8 Watt, A.D. (1986) Oecologia 70, 578-579 9 Dixon, 165-179
A.F.G.
(1971)
J. Appl. Ecol. 8,
The Way of All Flesh Recent VertebrateCarcasses and their Paleobiological Implications by Johannes Weigelt (transl. by Judith University of Chicago Schaefer), Press, 7989. $68.95/f47.95 hbk, $22.95/f15.95 pbk (xii + 188 pages) ISBN
0 226 88167
9
Death and its aftermath: this is the title of the first chapter of the longawaited translation of Weigelt’s classic work (originally published in 1927) on taphonomy, and perhaps no other statement can capture the essence of this work better. Weigelt’s descriptions of decaying carcasses, with putrefied flesh decomposing into foul-smelling fluids, are not for the weak of stomach. Many of these descriptions, in fact, would shame some of the scriptwriters of today’s horror movie genre. The first several chapters deal with anecdotal accounts of death, first as a process leading to decay, then in its various forms as a mode of introducing specimens into the fossil record, and finally as a means for interpreting skeletal remains within the fossil record. The most interesting chapters, arguably, are the later ones, which record the detailed observations of a mass death assemblage of vertebrates on the coastal plain of southeast Texas - the result of a severe winter cold spell following an extended period of drought - in the mid-1920s. These observations are subsequently put in perspective for interpreting mass deaths in the fossil record. To accompany the written observations, there are ample photographs and illustrations of carcasses
of different taxa, such as cattle, crocodiles, turtles and gars, all in various stages of decomposition. It is this mass of empirical data, collected by Weigelt, that provides the strength of this work, since few scientists today have recorded in a similar manner the details of death and decay. These data should prove to be extremely useful to taphonomists now working in terrestrial and marine deposits. A classic work can be viewed as one that is as relevant now as when it was written, and such is the case for this book. Indeed, Weigelt’s work represents the first major publication on taphonomy, even pre-dating the formal coining of the name of the field in 1940 by Efremov’. Weigelt clearly established a German tradition in the subject that influenced later German taphonomists, even though the volume was apparently largely overlooked by most current workers in the field. Heavily emphasized throughout the book is the importance of anas‘ trophic events’, which Wiegelt defined as’that occasional natural event that wipes out large portions of the animal world and depending on its frequency, regulates the propagation of species and displaces biotic communities’ (p. 121). With this definition there seems to be little need for the term; the effect is essentially the same as that of a catastrophic event. At the time Weigelt was writing, catastrophes (or anastrophes) were receiving very little scientific attention. Such punctuated or episodic events, Weigelt argued, are significant in the formation of major bone beds. There
is little doubt that this is true in one type of bone bed, but modern taphonomic thinking also recognizes the potential of time-averaging in the formation of bone beds2a3. It is now generally agreed that bone beds have the potential to encompass a biotic record that spans an extended interval of many years, and to preserve taxa that were not contemporaneous. Clearly, time-averaging is a significant phenomenon if one is attempting the transition from a taphonomic interpretation to a paleoecological interpretation of a bone assemblage, and presents quite different grounds from the catastrophe viewpoint for interpreting a particular bone bed. Overall, this volume, which has been largely inaccessible for so long, isexceedinglyvaluabletothoseinterested in the processes of death that can affecttheformation of bone beds. Judith Schaefer is to be commended for her efforts in the translation of this book, with the aid of Hans-Dieter Sues, and for bringing this important work to the forefront of taphonomy again.
Anthony R. Fiorillo Section of Vertebrate Fossils, The Carnegie Museum of Natural History, 4400 Forbes Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA
References 1 Efremov, LA. (1940)
Pan-Am. Geol. 74, 81-93 2 Behrensmever, A.K. (1982) Paleobiology 8, 21 l-227 3 Fiorillo. A.R. (1988) Curr. Res. Pleistocene 5, 103-I 09