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Ages - Extant
Equids - Glossary - References
Equidae in the Pleistocene
Members of
Equus during the Pleistocene may have resembled the
wild horses of today.
From the beginning
to the middle of the Pleistocene, species of Equus existed in large
numbers in Africa, Eurasia, and the Americas (Hunt 1995). By the late
Pleistocene, Equus, along with many other species of large mammals,
had become extinct in North and South America (Hunt 1995). There have
been two proposed explanations for this extinction: an inability to adapt
to the extreme climate change, and the appearance of humans on the American
continent, which led to overhunting of the American megafauna (Hunt 1995).