Article

Zimbabwe Enters a New and Potentially More Dangerous Covid-19 Phase

July 2020

Authors:

SPR BEECORPS Research Institute

Zimbabwe's Covid-19 Situation has taken a new twist with a rise in local transmissions, some of which are being discovered after the infected have passed through the formal Covid-19 management systems undetected. Some of the cases now being reported are not known to have travelled abroad or to have come into contact with people who have travelled or arrivals into Zimbabwe from outside including from South Africa which is Southern Africa's epicenter. This marks a major shift in the Covid19 situation in Zimbabwe and a potentially trying time for the country.

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A phylogeographic assessment of South African greater cane rats (Thryonomys swinderianus): Prelimina...

March 2023 · Vertebrate Zoology

[...]
Willem G. Coetzer

The greater cane rat ( Thryonomys swinderianus ) is an African rodent with a wide Sub-Saharan distribution range. This species is viewed as an important protein source in many African countries. These rodents are also regularly viewed as a pest species who frequently raid croplands in agricultural settings. No phylogenetic work has to date been published on T. swinderianus from southern Africa. ... [Show full abstract] This paper therefore reports the first phylogenetic assessment on the species across the South African distribution range. Thirty samples were sourced from local museum collections, with one direct submission by a member of the public who found a rodent carcass identified as T. swinderianus west of its known distribution range in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. Two mitochondrial loci previously used in West African studies of this species were used in the current study to asses T. swinderianus population genetic diversity and phylogenetic structure across the South African distribution. A comparison to sequence data from West Africa was also performed. A divergence time estimation was conducted to further investigate the evolutionary history of the South African sub-population. Similar genetic diversity estimates were observed for the South African sub-population when compared to the West African datasets. Specimens from the eastern parts of South Africa showed higher genetic diversity estimates, possibly indicative of an initial colonisation site from eastern Africa. Two distinct phylogenetic clades were identified by Bayesian inference, forming distinct West African and South African groups. The divergence estimates showed similar ages for the T. swinderianus most recent common ancestor (MRCA) as previously reported. The MRCA estimates for the South African group identified a possible middle to late Pleistocene migratory event from eastern African into southern Africa. Further fine scale sampling across the African distribution range is however needed to provide more accurate assessments for future conservation management planning for the different sub-populations, as needed.

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Reconstructing the geological provenance and long-distance movement of rectangular, fishtail, and cr...

March 2023 · PLoS ONE

The southern third of Africa is unusually rich in copper ore deposits. These were exploited by precolonial populations to manufacture wound-wire bangles, other forms of jewelry, and large copper ingots that were used as stores of copper or as forms of prestige. Rectangular, fishtail, and croisette ingots dating between the 5th and 20th centuries CE have been found in many locations in the ... [Show full abstract] Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Zambia, and Zimbabwe, with isolated finds in Malawi and Mozambique. Molds for casting these ingots have been found mostly in the Central African Copperbelt, but also around the Magondi Belt copper deposits in northern Zimbabwe. For years, scholars have debated whether these ingots were exclusively made in the Copperbelt or if the molds found in Zimbabwe indicate that local copies were produced from Magondi Belt copper ore (Garlake 1970; Bisson 1976). Before the recent application of lead isotopic and chemical methods to provenance copper in central and southern Africa, there was no way to discern between these hypotheses. Rademakers et al. (2019) and Stephens et al. (2020) showed that copper artifacts from southern DRC (mostly from Upemba) and from northwestern Botswana (Tsodilo Hills) match the lead isotope ratios of ores from the Copperbelt. Building upon these previous studies, we present here the first results from a copper provenance project across the southern third of Africa, from the Copperbelt to northern South Africa. We apply lead isotopic analysis (LIA) and chemical analyses to establish the provenance of 29 croisette ingots recovered in Zimbabwe, 2 fishtail and 1 rectangular ingot recovered from sites in Zambia, and an "X" shaped ingot smelted in an experiment in Zambia in the 1970's. Our chemistry and lead isotopic results indicate that 16 of these objects were smelted with copper from the Copperbelt, 16 objects source more specifically to the Kipushi deposit within this geological district, and only one HXR ingot sources to the Magondi Belt in Zimbabwe. Taken together, we clearly illustrate that croisette ingots were traveling significant distances to reach their eventual sites of deposition, and that there was also local production of these objects in Zimbabwe.

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Knob-billed Duck Sarkidiornis melanotos moulting in the Free State

March 2023 · Biodiversity Observations

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Martin Potgieter

Some Knob-billed Ducks Sarkidiornis melanotos in flightless moult were photographed on a farm dam in the central Free State Province of South Africa in May 2019. Although fairly common in the north-eastern quarter of southern Africa, this is apparently only the third record of this species moulting in the sub-region.

Article

Revisiting the age of the Florisbad hominin material

March 2023 · Homo: internationale Zeitschrift fur die vergleichende Forschung am Menschen

In 1996, Grün and coworkers provided an ESR age determination for a hominin molar from Florisbad, South Africa, at 259 ± 35 ka. The most anatomically informative hominin specimen from Florisbad is a fragmentary craniofacial specimen, attributed by many to early Homo sapiens, which has been assumed to derive from the same individual as this tooth. Since 1996, evidence about the evolutionary ... [Show full abstract] context for the later Middle Pleistocene and its associated hominins in Africa had markedly changed. If the Florisbad date is accurate and if the molar is associated with the craniofacial specimen, this evidence may suggest that Homo naledi coexisted in time and geography with H. sapiens in southern Africa. Thus, the accuracy for all dates needs critical investigation. This study examines the published record of excavation and subsequent analyses for the Florisbad material. We find that the contemporary records raise doubt about the contemporaneity of the tooth and calvaria. The site's complex stratigraphy and the details about the tooth's discovery also pose challenges for the previous ESR age estimate. Because the fragmentary cranial specimen has value for morphological comparisons, developing additional means of understanding its geological age is necessary. The current data do not demonstrate the presence of H. sapiens in southern Africa at ~260 ka.