Faunal assemblage

The biostratigraphic unit is a section of geological strata that is defined on the basis of its characteristic fossil taxa or faunal assemblage.

Faunal assemblages are also analyzed in archaeological deposits, where they are influenced by cultural activities in addition to ecological processes and natural taphonomy.

[12] Conversely, a death assemblage is composed of species that did not live in the place they were deposited and incorporated into the paleontological record.

[14] For life assemblages in which a community was completely buried in-situ by a sudden event such as a storm or mudslide, time averaging does not affect interpretation.

One such assemblage at Lang Rongrien in Thailand indicated a hunter-gatherer group which was highly flexible when it came to finding food.

They relied heavily on turtle and tortoise to supply the meat portion of their diet when hunting large game was unpredictable.

Archaeological deposits are always affected by cultural processes and therefore represent human activities, rather than a complete ecological community.

[20] By scavenging or through direct feeding by their human counterparts, dogs and other canids can such severe damage to the bones that identification by archaeologists is impossible.