Overview

• The PNAS paper, led by University of Montpellier researchers, charts 8,000 years of body-size change across Mediterranean France.
• Regression modeling partitions non-linear trajectories into four phases spanning the Neolithic through the modern era.
• From roughly 1000 to 2000 CE, domestic sheep, goats, cattle, pigs and chickens increased in size while wild red deer, foxes, hares and rabbits trended smaller.
• Authors attribute domestic gains to selective breeding and managed husbandry, with wildlife declines tied to habitat loss, fragmentation and intensified hunting.
• For most of the record, wild and domestic species moved in step before diverging in the last millennium, reflecting growing human impact.