Hello everyone! Wow! What a busy time in my life. I just went to a baby shower for one of my daughters, and a bridal shower for a niece, a wedding for a friend, and soon another baby shower for my other daughter! All were beautiful and had a unique themes. I loved them all!
So how did all this planet’s wonderfully unique plant and animal assemblages (themes, lol) get to where they are at today? Why are there only howler monkeys in Cental and South America and Madagascar palms only found in Madagascar? And what about the Livingstonia palms found only in Palm Valley of central Australia? Is it possible that these species traveled (by foot, wing, wind, or carrier) only in one direction after the flood? Did seeds of certain plants float only to one spot? Let’s take a look at the answers.
1) A portion of this was covered last week; if you remember we established it was not only possible but likely different species had small populations that migrated ahead of competition and predators. These small populations may have only resided in an area for a few generations. Therefore no fossils would be found. Animals that crossed land bridges before they were cut off would have then been isolated.
2) Also if you recall from an earlier blog post, we know the immediate post flood climate was much wetter (see blog about wet deserts). Many plants, and animals that depended on the variety of plants found in wetter environments would have been abundant during that time. They then would have gradually ceased to exist in the places that dried out. Only areas that remained moist, and thus were protected from drying out, would have retained the plant assemblages we now find there - and are now unique to that area. So the answer is not that the animals trekked across hundreds of miles of desert to reach the rain forests, or seeds floated there, but rather the animals in the rain forests are descendents of the earliest migrators (thus reaching the farthest regions) of the creatures who left the ark.
3) What about those animals who have specialized diets, like the giant panda or koalas of Australia? “We don’t know, of course, that bamboo shoots or blue gum leaves (or any of the other 19 species of eucalypt trees koalas can eat) were not then flourishing all along their eventual respective migratory paths. In fact, this may have influenced the direction they took.”i
4) Another thing to consider is the animals that came off the ark (two of each animal kind) would not have been specialized and therefore more hardy to survive in the wild (i.e. a wolf is more hardy than say a Chihuahua, and is much more closely related to the original canine kind). So it is highly possible that the ancestors of creatures such as the giant panda or the koala were not so specialized and would have been able to survive on a broader diet (remember specialization is the result of “a loss of genetic information, from thinning out of the gene pool or by degenerative mutation”ii).
5) And finally, (and most fascinating) what about the ape fossils that are consistently found below human fossils throughout Africa. Evolution explains it well in that humans evolved from apes and therefore would naturally be found in layers of earth below humans. But is this true? Now let’s put on our biblical, eye-opening, reality glasses. The animals, including the original monkey/ape kind, would have begun to spread out over the earth as soon as God opened the doors of the ark. But man, as we discussed in previous blogs (see blogs about Babel), delayed moving away from the Ararat/plain of Shinar region until over a hundred years later…not reaching certain parts of the earth until many hundreds of years later. Thus, it is perfectly logical that “some ape fossils would be found consistently below human fossils, since people would have arrived in Africa after the apes.iii Pretty simple explanation really!
Isn’t it wonderful how the bible gives us so many scientific answers to major evolutionary puzzles in history!
Until next time, God bless and take care!
Willow
PS – The Perseid meteor shower (best viewing 11:00 to midnight) continues, though Saturday was the peak. Venus stands out as the brightest star looking east/northeast around 3:00 am on august 13th. And by August 16th, he’s back! Who? Orion! He tips up over the east/southeast horizon just before first light. Look for him to the right of Venus (most brilliant ‘star’ in the sky).References:
i, ii, iiiThe Revised And Expanded Answers Book, Ken Ham, et. al., March , pgs 214-217.
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