北京门头沟牛眼洞晚更新世哺乳动物化石

北京市门头沟牛眼洞产有豹、岩羊和纳呼尔绵羊等３种哺乳动物化石。其中豹化石尺 寸相当小，小于所有已知的化石记录，根据贝格曼法则以及与现代豹不同亚种的对比，表明它 应该是一种热带和亚热带的动物，这一发现指示当时的气候环境正处于间冰阶的暖期中。结 合整个哺乳动物化石的性质，说明其时代为晚更新世晚期。

THE LATE PLEISTOCENE MAMMALIAN FOSSILS FROM NIUYAN CAVE IN MENTOUGOU,BEIJING,CHINA

Niuyan Cave is located at Miushou Mountain in Mentougou, Beijing(39°54' N latitude,115°36' E longitude). A lot of vertebrate fossils were excavated from this cave,including many mammalian skulls and limb bones as well as a few bones of birds. The mammalian fossils are recognized as Panthera pardus, Ovis nahoor and Pseudois nayaur. Specimens of P. pardus from Niuyan Cave are smaller than all the other known fossil records, e. g. P. pardus from Zhoukoudian and Gongwangling. They are also smaller than most of the recent P. pardus. Recent P. pardus distributes in many regions of Asia and Africa. The body sizes of recent P. pardus reflect the Bergmann's Law typically. The more their distribution regions are close to the tropics, the smaller their body sizes are. The smallest subspecies of recent P. pardus is P. p. nanopardus that distributes in Somalia near the equator. The Yinxu fauna from Anyang and the Upper Cave fauna during the warm period contained the minor P. pardus, but P. pardus from Niuyan Cave is even smaller than them. According to the Bergmann's Law, the small P. pardus from Niuyang cave shows that it should live in hot south regions and be a tropical or subtropical animal. The discovery of the small P. pardus fossils from Niuyan Cave indicates that the climate in Beijing district at that time was very warm. Combining with the stratigraphic distribution of Ovis nahoor and Pseudois nayaur, the age of these mammalian fossils should be of fare Late Pleistocene, about 30ha-- 20kaB.P. There is no any human trace in Miuyan Cave. It might be a natural trap for animals.