What is Pliocene?
The '''Pliocene''' ('''Pleiocene''' in older texts) was a short [[geology|geological]] [[Epoch (geology)|epoch]] at the end of the [[Neogene]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/tertiary/pliocene.php|title=The Pliocene Epoch|website=www.ucmp.berkeley.edu}}</ref> It is also the fifth and final epoch of the former [[Tertiary]] period and the fifth epoch of the [[Cainozoic]]. It began 5.3 [[million]] years ago and ended 2.6 million years ago. The Pliocene follows the [[Miocene]] and is followed by the [[Pleistocene]]. The world continued to get cooler and drier in the Pliocene. [[Tropical]] [[rain forest]]s and [[deciduous]] [[forest]]s shrank. [[Grassland]]s grew, and many [[herbivorous]] [[mammal]]s became [[grazer]]s instead of [[browser]]s. Of this we are certain, because their teeth tell us what kind of food they ate. Browsers eat leaves and small branches, and grazers eat grass. The concept of ''mesowear'' deals with this. Mesowear is a method based on animals' tooth wear fingerprints. Each animal has special feeding habits, which cause unique tooth wear. Rough feeds cause serious tooth abrasion, while smooth one triggers moderate abrasion. So [[Browser|browsers]] have teeth with moderate abrasion and [[Grazer|grazers]] have teeth with rough abrasion.<ref> Clauss M; Franz-Odendaal T.A; Brasch J; Castell J.C; Kaiser T. 2007. Tooth wear in captive giraffes (Giraffa camelopardalis): mesowear analysis classifies free-ranging specimens as browsers but captive ones as grazers. ''Journal of Zoo and Wildlife Medicine'', '''38'''(3):433-445. [https://bioone.org/journals/journal-of-zoo-and-wildlife-medicine/volume-38/issue-3/06-032.1/TOOTH-WEAR-IN-CAPTIVE-GIRAFFES-GIRAFFA-CAMELOPARDALIS--MESOWEAR-ANALYSIS/10.1638/06-032.1.full]</ref> Seeing the teeth of browsers next to those of grazers is convincing.<ref>Patnaik, Rajeev; Singh, Ningthoujam Premjit; Paul, Debajyoti; Sukumar, Raman 2019. Dietary and habitat shifts in relation to climate of Neogene-Quaternary proboscideans and associated mammals of the Ind