Caption: This painting by artist Carl Buell depcits a scene from the late Eocene of North America. The rhino‑like animals in the background are brontotheres. The pony‑sized Hyracodon, a closer relative of living rhinos, in the foreground.
Caption: This painting by artist Carl Buell depcits a scene from the late Eocene of North America. The rhino‑like animals in the background are brontotheres. The pony‑sized Hyracodon, a closer relative of living rhinos, in the foreground.
It’s true. I’ve heard Helen Thomas say that’s what it was like when she was younger. /s
Global climate during the Late Eocene was warmer than today. Ice had just begun to form at the South Pole. India was covered by tropical rainforests, and Warm Temperate forests covered much of Austrlia.
The Eocene Epoch contained a wide variety of different climate conditions that includes the warmest climate in the Cenozoic Era and ends in an icehouse climate. The evolution of the Eocene climate began with warming after the end of the Palaeocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM) at 56 million years ago to a maximum during the Eocene Optimum at around 49 million years ago. During this period of time, little to no ice was present on Earth with a smaller difference in temperature from the equator to the poles. Following the maximum, was a descent into an icehouse climate from the Eocene Optimum to the Eocene-Oligocene transition at 34 million years ago. During this decrease ice began to reappear at the poles, and the Eocene-Oligocene transition is the period of time where the Antarctic ice sheet began to rapidly expand.