User:Noa0910
Gigantopithecus
This species, estimated to reach about 3 m tall and weighing about 300 to 540 kg, is currently the largest primate ever in history.[1]
It seems to have appeared in about one million years in China India, Vietnam, etc and it is not confirmed after 300 thousand years ago.
The cause of extinction seems to be that the large body of this ape could not adapt to the changing climate.
"Because of its size, Gigantopithecus has relied on a large amount of food.In the Pleistocene, many forests have changed to savanna grasslands, and for the huge ape, it was simply "The food supply was insufficient," said Elbe Bohemence, Tubingen University in Germany, who conducted this research.
Gigantopithecus was eating the fruit, but could not adapt to the grass, roots, leaves which were supposed to became the main food source in the new environment. If the body was a little smaller, it might have managed to survive. "Some relatives of this huge ape, like Orang Utan, have survived while focusing on specific environments, because they metabolized slowly and could live with less food.
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- ^ "類人猿ギガントピテクス、大きすぎて絶滅していた". natgeo.nikkeibp.co.jp (in Japanese). Retrieved 2018-12-08.