[Rurudyne]

You know, we hear about how indelibly human poop marks a place for centuries afterwards ... I’ve never heard anyone studying a similar effect to research ancient deer or wolf populations.

I wonder why that is?

I mean, unless Mankind is somehow special you would expect that you could find evidence of at least herd species in the soil too from which you could infer which species were common and what their populations might have been like ... consequently then infer things about their environment too.

Seems like it would be a life’s work for some PhD wannabe.

[SunkenCiv]

Using DNA to figure out the species is a breakthrough. Study of non-human coprolites of living species in the Americas probably won't really tell anyone much. Coprolites that don't match up to living species will probably be studied now. OTOH:

• Attempted DNA extraction from a Rancho La Brea Columbian mammoth (Mammuthus columbi):
  prospects for ancient DNA from asphalt deposits [2014]