Heffatheirum

Guest Entry by Godzilla-30

"To the left of the  Creation Wall is a depiction of several animals found on the Mossfells during the time of the Shearpoint people including artic walrus, a duo of diminutive woolly mammoths, a titan solenopanther, lesser cockatrice, and a Megalonyx with its offspring."

-Description of the Creation Wall, Shearpoint Cave

"On these verdant fields in what will one day be the Lake of Tears, a herd of Heffatherium grazes peacefully. These pygmies are the last vestiges of an ancient lineage of giant pachyderms."

-Excerpt from Musphels: Lands Lost to Time, Narr. By David Attenborough 

Heffatheirum (Gomphotherium insulare)

Status: Extinct

During the last ice age, Colombian mammoths and American mastodons lumbered through the plains and forests of North America. Only a few hundred miles off of the coast of what would one day be Massachusetts, an even older relative of the elephant still trumpeted. Gomphotherium insulare, more commonly called Heffatherium, was the final diminutive descendant of giants.

Other Gomphotheres had long disappeared from mainland North America around 5 million years ago due to a combination of climate changes and competition from other grazing animals arriving to the Americas via the Bering land bridge. While the mainland Gomphotheres disappeared, these island offshoots survived and thrived. Gomphotheres were known to be capable swimmers and populated many islands from the Mediterranean to the Caribbean. In a similar vein, the ancestors of Heffatherium were able to survive a prolonged oceanic journey. Heffatherium fossils are found throughout the Mossfell Islands and commonly on both the Georges Bank, Martha's Vineyard, and Nantucket, indicating that the animal was more than capable of swimming long distances in search of either food or mates.

When these first Gomphotheres arrived to the Mossfells around 6 million years ago, the islands were much more alien than today. Gigantic birds and tortoises were the largest herbivores on the isles while only a few species of small mammals had emigrated. Over the course of the following 5 million years several of these titans were outcompeted by their new mammalian neighbors.  Heffatherium are believed to have been predominately grazers, much like their mainland cousins. During the late Miocene and the Pleistocene, the climate of the Mossfell islands was much cooler and drier than it was now. This meant most of the islands were covered in scrub forests and fields. The fields provided the pygmy pachyderms ample resources to feed upon. For several million years, the voracious appetitive of Heffatherium led to them becoming ecosystem engineers. Heffatherium grazing prevented island slopes from developing large forest cover, while their manure both fertilized the soil as well as spread seeds throughout the isles. While this phenomenon was beneficial for Heffatherium, this drastic reduction in forest cover led to the extinction of many lineages of endemic birds and reptiles even before the end of the ice age and the arrival of humans to the archipelago.

Like many other examples of dwarf elephants found throughout the word from Cyprus to Java, environmental pressures led to Heffatherium adopting a much stouter and smaller form than their mainland cousins. Like other proboscideans, Heffatherium is believed to have been a social animal, and traveled in herds consisting of either adult females and their offspring as well or groups of males. During mating season, males entered into a state of musth where they became more hostile toward each other and competed for mates. It is believed that female Heffatherium bore only one offspring at a time.

Fossil remains of Heffatherium date as early as 6 million years ago and as recently as 5,000 years ago. While the factors leading to the disappearance of Heffatherium are still debated, it is widely accepted that climate changes leading to decreased grazing area as well as the arrival of humans to the area are what spelled doom for the last holdouts of the Gomphotherium genus. Bones of butchered Heffatherium are commonly found in archeological sites on the Mossfell Islands, the Georges Bank, and Nantucket. Prior to the arrival of human hunters, a juvenile Heffatherium was likely only threatened by titan solenopanthers or mosjk bears. Working in groups, humans could easily surround and kill these relatively small pachyderms. While humans themselves disappeared from the isles around 7,000 years ago, Heffatherium were not far behind. Through a combination of population collapse and a continued reversion of steppe fields to forests, the species quickly died out. Ironically, their disappearance led to the survival of many endemic species through a rebound of forest cover throughout the isles.