The wild goose apparently became a domestic goose at a surprisingly early age: According to an examination of the remains of the birds, the inhabitants of a village in what is now China raised the birds and fed them with rice 7,000 years ago. According to the researchers, geese could have been domesticated before chickens, making them the oldest feathered farm animals known to mankind.
Once upon a time, people had to rely solely on their luck at the hunt to provide themselves with meat and other animal products. But in the course of the development of agriculture over 10,000 years ago, animal husbandry also found its way into human culture: It is assumed that the first domesticated farm animals were sheep, pigs, goats and cattle. Poultry followed later. The most important feathered farm animal used to be the oldest: the first chicken birds could have been kept 8,000 years ago – but the relevant information is disputed and therefore not certain. Unequivocal evidence of chicken keeping, on the other hand, only goes back to around 5000 years ago. The other representatives of the poultry came later, so far emerged from finds. The earliest keeping of geese was in the second millennium BC. occupied. But that has now changed.
A questioning look at Stone Age goose bones
The results of the researchers led by Masaki Eda from the University of Hokkaido are based on the examination of goose bones with human processing marks that were discovered in the area of a Stone Age village in eastern China. According to earlier finds, the residents of Tianluoshan were already cultivating rice, but they also made a living from hunting and fishing. It was initially obvious that the goose bones found during the archaeological investigations came from hunted wild animals. Wild geese still spend the winter in the region today. However, it also seemed conceivable that the birds were already being kept. Therefore, Eda and his colleagues have devoted a more detailed study to the goose bones from Tianluoshan. Various morphological and biochemical analysis techniques were used and the age of the remains was determined using radiocarbon dating.
As the scientists report, they discovered bones under the remains of the geese, which, according to the characteristics, clearly came from a young bird that could not have flown in to overwinter. Instead, he had hatched and raised in the area of the discovery site. As the scientists explain, however, there is no wild goose species that breeds naturally in the area of the former village today, and it can be assumed that this was the case even in the Stone Age.
Goose attitude is emerging
The results of isotope analyzes of the bones of the adult geese provided further evidence of a human attitude. They reflected features of the diet and habitat of animals. The researchers were able to compare the corresponding signatures with those of the wild geese that are now winter guests in the region. The results showed that the animals from Tianluoshan were not migratory birds, but spent the whole year at the site. In addition, there were indications that they had eaten special food – presumably rice. The results were rounded off by the dating of the bones: They confirmed that the goose bones are around 7000 years old and therefore did not slip from younger layers into the area of the Stone Age find layer.
The scientists conclude: “The findings and contextual evidence suggest that the geese in Tianluoshan village were at an early stage of domestication,” write Eda and his colleagues. They suspect that goose farming evolved to meet the demand for meat and bone tools when the wild migratory birds were unavailable. Against the background of the unclear domestication history of the chicken, which may only go back 5000 years, the scientists also conclude from the study results: “The goose is possibly the oldest domesticated poultry species in history”.
Source: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, doi: 10.1073/pnas.2117064119