By examining fossils from 19 archaeological sites in Jordan’s Azraq Basin, researchers have concluded that gazelles, hares, and foxes shrank in size at the end of the Ice Age.¹ This news, published in an open-access journal article,² should be of interest to creationists for two reasons.

First, the paper mentions in passing that fossils in the Azraq Basin show a “typical steppic faunal spectrum.”² A steppe is a flat area of grassland with few or no trees. Thus, the animals (fauna) in the area at the time were those one would expect to inhabit a forestless grassland. This is a reminder that grasslands were common during the Ice Age, but thick forests were rare, even in places not covered by glaciers.³ This absence of thick forests is easily explained in the context of the Genesis Flood. All the world’s trees were uprooted, and most were buried as coal seams during the yearlong Flood,⁴ which was followed by a roughly 700-year-long Ice Age.⁵ Since a naturally-seeded forest can take centuries, perhaps even a millennium, to become mature,⁶ thick forests would have been globally rare during the post-Flood Ice Age—and they were, with the possible (but unlikely) exceptions of South America, Australia, and Antarctica.⁷ The Genesis patriarchs sometimes used individual trees as geographic landmarks,⁸ which also makes sense of these observations. That present-day Jordan apparently had a steppe environment at the end of the Ice Age is just another reminder of this global pattern.

Second, human lifespans decreased dramatically after the Flood (Genesis 11), and such a decrease in lifespans likely occurred in the animal kingdom, as well. Much research has shown that larger body sizes and delayed maturation are often associated with greater longevity in living animals. In this light, it is interesting that there is much fossil evidence that mammals all over the world became smaller at the end of the Ice Age, as did at least some other creatures.⁹ Could this decrease in body size be an indicator that animal longevity, like human longevity, was decreasing at this time?

The authors argued that the size decreases were driven by climate change and were interspecific, meaning that smaller species entered the Azraq Basin, out-competed the larger species already living there, and replaced these earlier populations. However, the authors also noted that such Ice Age size decreases are generally thought to be intraspecific, meaning they occurred within already existing species.

Alongside the global extinction of many large-bodied mammals during the Late Pleistocene and into the Holocene, a related trend is for intra-specific body-size shifts – mainly diminutions – in large mammals that survived as they adapted to new environments.²

In other words, these mammal populations were not replaced by populations of similar but smaller mammals. Rather, these creatures just became smaller for some reason. This could be an example of continuous environmental tracking (CET), in which creatures detect and quickly adapt to changes in their environments in targeted and predictable ways.¹⁰ One example of this phenomenon is island giantism and dwarfism, in which large and small animals shrink and grow, respectively, when they colonize an island environment. So this post-Flood reduction in body size might also demonstrate CET, where smaller body sizes generally might have been better suited to the post-Flood environment for some reason.

ICR research continues to show both direct and indirect evidence that several fossil animals were larger, grew over a longer period of time, and lived longer than similar creatures living today.^11–15 Despite the denials of many even in Christendom, the great longevities of the Genesis patriarchs are literal history, not allegory or myth, and scientific evidence continues to accumulate, showing that this longevity characterized not just the first humans but the first animals, as well.

References

1. Bird, H. Azraq Basin Fossils Reveal Mammals Shrank during Pleistocene-Holocene Climate Shift. Phys.org. Posted on phys.org January 23, 2025, accessed January 27, 2025.
2. Martin, L., J. Roe, and L. Yeomans. 2025. Late Pleistocene-Holocene Mammalian Body Size Change in Jordan’s Azraq Basin: A Case for Climate Driven Species Distribution Shifts. Quaternary Science Reviews. 350.
3. Hebert, J. 2020. Missing Ice Age Forests Fit Flood/Ice Age Model. Acts & Facts. 49 (6): 16–19.
4. Tomkins, J. P. and T. Clarey. 2020. Paleontology Confirms a Late Cenozoic N-Q Flood Boundary. Acts & Facts. 49 (11): 10–13.
5. Hebert, J. 2018. The Bible Best Explains the Ice Age. Acts & Facts. 47 (11): 10–13.
6. Eng, K. F. How to Grow a Forest Really, Really Fast. TED Fellows. Posted on fellowsblog.ted.com February 18, 2015, accessed January 27, 2025.
7. Little is known about possible Antarctic forests due to its thick ice sheet. Fossil pollen data from South American are rare, which is itself prima facie evidence that forests were rare in Ice Age South America. There is also prima facie evidence for a dearth of forests in Ice Age Australia. However, creation researcher Michael Oard thinks there are uncertainties about the dating of Australian Ice Age deposits and that Ice Age Australian rainfall was heavy (reference 3). However, the true limiting factor for Ice Age forests would have been the seeds, not rainfall. Hence, even with heavy Ice Age Australian rainfall, growth of mature forests would likely still have taken a long time.
8. See Genesis 12:6; 35:4; 35:8. This evidence is admittedly equivocal, since individual trees on steppes or savannahs can be used as geographic markers, even today.
9. Hebert, J. 2024. Late Pleistocene Body Size Reduction: Evidence of a Post-Flood Decline in Longevity? Journal of Creation. 38 (1): 60–66.
10. Guliuzza, R. J. 2019. Engineered Adaptability: Continuous Environmental Tracking Wrap-Up. Acts & Facts. 48 (8): 17–19.
11. Hebert, J. ICR Research is Revealing Evidence for Pre-Flood Longevity. Creation Science Update. Posted on ICR.org October 30, 2023, accessed January 27, 2025.
12. Hebert, J. 2024. Oysters and Pre-Flood Longevity. Acts & Facts. 53 (3): 19.
13. Hebert, J. 2024. Fossil Sharks Show Signs of Greater Past Longevity. Acts & Facts. 53 (5): 20.
14. Hebert, J. Methuselah-Like Longevity in Pre-Flood Mammals. Creation Science Update. Posted on ICR.org October 7, 2024, accessed January 27, 2025. 
15. Hebert, J. 2025. Fossil Crocs Hint at Extreme Longevity. Acts & Facts. 54 (2): 18. In press.

* Dr. Jake Hebert is a research associate at the Institute for Creation Research and earned his Ph.D. in physics from the University of Texas at Dallas.