The initial individuals to arrive in Australia were fossil seekers

The world used to be significantly stranger

According to the existing archaeological findings, it appears that humans first arrived in Australia approximately 65,000 years ago. During that era, the continent was inhabited by an unusual variety of enormous marsupials and colossal flightless birds, even larger and more intimidating than contemporary emus and cassowaries. For the following 20,000 years, Australia’s First Peoples coexisted with short-faced kangaroos; Zygomaturus trilobus, a massive 500-kilogram marsupial reminiscent of a rhinoceros; and Diprotodon optatum, the largest marsupial known to have existed: a 3,000-kilogram giant that roamed in large herds (imagine a bear the scale of a bison with the face of a woodchuck).

These species went extinct around 45,000 to 40,000 years ago; today, they are remembered through ancient rock art and legends, some of which seem to depict human interactions with species that are no longer alive.

Given that they had lived alongside humans for a minimum of 20,000 years by that time, it does not appear that the abrupt arrival of humans led to an instant mass extinction. However, it is plausible that through hunting or even by setting controlled fires, humans may have exerted just enough pressure on these megafauna to render them vulnerable to the subsequent climatic changes that ultimately led to their demise.

In various regions around the globe, there’s tangible proof that Pleistocene humans hunted or scavenged meat from the remains of now-extinct megafauna. In other areas, archaeologists continue to debate whether humans, the inevitable conclusion of the last Ice Age, or some mixture of both factors was responsible for the extinction of the planet’s grand Ice Age giants. The relationship between humans and their local ecosystems has appeared (and continues to appear) diverse everywhere, influenced by varying cultures, environments, and numerous other elements.