Content uploaded by Stéphane Peigné
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Stéphane Peigné on May 20, 2015
Content may be subject to copyright.
A preview of the PDF is not available
32. Carnivora
Abstract and Figures
The order Carnivora has a shorter history in Africa than on any other continent except Australasia and South America. The definite record of the order on the African continent extends back to the Lower Miocene, though some earlier records may exist. During this time, the order has diversified enormously, first as a result of migrations from Eurasia and later as a result of in situ speciation. Despite this, little is known about the history of African Carnivora compared with most continents, mainly due to the geographically biased fossil record on the African continent. For the Plio-Pleistocene, only parts of northern, eastern, and southern Africa have an adequate Carnivoran fossil record, and for the Miocene the situation is much worse, as only some time slices of this epoch have an adequate record in some parts of eastern Africa. This chapter describes the systematic paleontology of Pholidota. It reviews more than 100 genera and about twice that many species. The organization is by family (in standard order) and genus. The chapter concludes with short sections on biogeography and migration patterns.
Figures - uploaded by Stéphane Peigné
Author content
All figure content in this area was uploaded by Stéphane Peigné
Content may be subject to copyright.
Here, we describe and revise craniodental material from Langebaanweg ‘E’ Quarry (South Africa, early Pliocene, ∼5.2 Ma), which represents one of the largest and best-preserved collections of sabertooth felids from Mio-Pliocene deposits of Africa. Four taxa, including two new species, are recognized: Lokotunjailurus chinsamyae sp. nov., Adeilosmilus aff. kabir, Yoshi obscura, and Dinofelis werdelini sp. nov. The felid guild composition analyzed herein suggests the presence of a mosaic environment with open components in the region, and shows a potential relationship with that of Yuanmou, suggesting a similar environment and/or dispersal route/event. The reassessment of the rich early Pliocene felids from Langebaanweg is a step toward understanding the transition and evolution of the felids in the southern hemisphere during the late Miocene to early Pliocene.
The iconic sabretooth Homotherium is thought to have hunted cooperatively, but the origin of this behaviour and correlated morphological adaptations are largely unexplored. Here we report the most primitive species of Amphimachairodus (Amphimachairodus hezhengensis sp. nov.), a member of Machairodontini basal to Homotherium, from the Linxia Basin, northeastern border of the Tibetan Plateau (9.8-8.7 Ma). The long snout, laterally oriented and posteriorly located orbit of Amphimachairodus suggest a better ability to observe the surrounding environment, rather than targeting single prey, pointing to an adaptation to the open environment or social behaviour. A pathological forepaw of Amphimachairodus provides direct evidence of partner care. Our analyses of trait evolutionary rates support that traits correlated with killing behaviour and open environment adaptation evolved prior to other traits, suggesting that changes in hunting behaviour may be the major evolutionary driver in the early evolution of the lineage. A. hezhengensis represents one of the most important transitions in the evolution of Machairodontini, leading to adaptation in open environments and contributing to their further dispersal and radiation worldwide. This rapid morphological change is likely to be correlated with increasingly arid environments caused by the rise of the Tibetan Plateau, and competition from abundant large carnivores in this area.
The family Nimravidae is poorly known from the Siwalik Group that comprises freshwater deposits having an age that spans 18.0-0.6 Ma. The new material recovered from the Dhok Ban Ameer Khatoon (Chinji Formation) and Sethi Nagri (type locality of the Nagri Formation) is assigned to Sansanosmilus rhomboidalis based on the morphology of canine. The recovered material is unique and rare in the
Siwaliks of northern Pakistan. It also increases the stratigraphic range of this barbourofelines species from the Chinji Formation to the Nagri Formation.
Recently collected carnivoran specimens from the Siwalik Group of Pakistan are described and discussed. These specimens add to our knowledge of the previously known taxa while also adding to our biogeo-graphic, stratigraphic, and temporal knowledge of the carnivorans from the Siwaliks. At least eight distinct taxa are identified, and although most specimens are fragmentary, some hyaenid specimens are identified further (e.g. Lycyaena and Ictitherium). We identify and describe the first herpestid fossils from the Chinji Formation, the first hyaenid (Lycyaena cf. L. dubia) from the Tatrot Formation, and the first definitive occurrence of Ictitherium (Ictitherium cf. I. viverrinum) from the Dhok Pathan Formation. We report the first occurrences of several taxa from various sites in the Siwaliks of Pakistan, including the first reports of any carnivorans from Dhok Milan, Kohtehra, and Lawa. Individual sites show a wide range of carnivoran biodiversity, however larger scale trends are more discernible when comparing those between formations in the Siwaliks. Several taxa disappear over time from the carnivoran fauna of the Siwaliks, starting with barbourofelines, and continuing with amphicyonids (and non-carnivoran hyaenodontids). Felids and mus-telids are the most diverse carnivorans in the Siwaliks, while caniforms become more prevalent through time. ARTICLE HISTORY
We describe the most complete postcranial remains of a pathological, large-bodied sabretooth from the Lower Pliocene site of Langebaanweg ‘E’ Quarry (South Africa). The skeleton consists of hind limb and vertebral elements that exhibit distinctive exostoses, osteophytes and eburnation. We performed a quantitative morphological comparison of the new postcranial remains found in Langebaanweg, with other Neogene and Quaternary sabretooth and non-sabretooth felids, consisting of the genera Amphimachairodus, Machairodus, Lokotunjailurus, Dinofelis, Panthera, Homotherium and Smilodon from several sites in Africa, Europe and North America, using principal component analysis and Mosimann transformations. Although the pathological deformation of the remains distorted some of the linear measurements, most of the analysed variables do not contain pathological features, and strongly indicate that
the Langebaanweg sabretooth is morphologically closer to Machairodus aphanistus and Lokotunjailurus emageritus than it is to Amphimachairodus giganteus. This indicates that the remains could belong to an undetermined sabretooth species from the Langebaanweg locality. The observed pathologies in the foot and lumbar spine are consistent with diagnostic criteria for severe osteoarthritis (due to maturity), which would have limited limb mobility with severe consequences for hunting success
The Kromdraai archaeological site is located in a fossiliferous paleokarst situated in the UNESCO World Heritage Site referred to as the “Cradle of Humankind” in the Gauteng Province of South Africa. Kromdraai is noteworthy because it features among the three southern African early hominin-bearing sites considered to represent distinct temporal periods within the same stratigraphic succession. Kromdraai also yielded a partial skull and dentition (TM 1517) in 1938 that was designated as the holotype of a new genus and species, Paranthropus robustus. Although the hominin fossil assemblage collected from Kromdraai between 1938 and 2014 is rather paltry, morphometric and cladistic analyses of this material suggested that it represented a somewhat less-derived form of P. robustus than the considerably larger assemblage from the nearby site of Swartkrans. However, the geochronological and biotic relationships among the P. robustus-bearing sites in South Africa are not resolved. Since 2014, the previously unknown, albeit densely fossiliferous Unit P produced 51 individually catalogued hominin fossils (36 craniodental and 15 postcranial) that currently represent 13% of the faunal assemblage from this unit with a minimum number of 10 juvenile and 9 adult individuals. P. robustus and early Homo coexisted at the time of the accumulation of Unit P at Kromdraai, with a relative abundance of 89% and 11%, respectively. P. robustus and early Homo are associated with a highly diverse fauna that includes several water-dependent species, and a large variety of bovid and carnivore taxa. Biochronological data from Unit P and an interval of reversed polarity measured in younger deposits above it are interpreted in the context of the regional chronological framework to infer that it represents a deposit that was likely accumulated prior to 2 Ma.
The Plio-Pleistocene site of Kromdraai, covering a chronological range from 1.8 Ma (Kromdraai A Locality) up to older than 2.0 Ma (Kromdraai Member 2), (Cradle of Humankind, Gauteng, South Africa) has been investigating since the first half of the XXth century. These researches have led to the discovery of the type specimen of Paranthropus robustus. Kromdraai is also characterized by an extremely rich bone accumulation (including more than 10000 remains with more than 4800 from the recent field works). Carnivores are highly diverse including Felidae, Hyaenidae, Herpestidae, Viverridae, Mustelidae and Canidae. Based on 27 newly discovered dental and postcranial specimens, a new canid species is described. Canis hewitti sp. nov. is comparable in size to the extant African hunting dog Lycaon pictus but it differs significantly from this species in dental features that are typical of the genus Canis including the m1 with a trigonid of about two-thirds the length of the crown, a metaconid clearly dissociated from the protoconid and a talonid consisting in a hypoconid and an entoconid. Its premolars suggest a certain specialization in meat-cutting (long and thin p4 with a high protoconid backwardly flanked of a well-developed cusp followed by an accessory small denticle). C. hewitti appears as the potential ancestor of the more robust southern African Canis atrox from Kromdraai A (ca. 1.8 Ma).
The tribe Machairodontini is a major lineage of felid sabertooth cats that flourished in the late Cenozoic
and included the top predators in the ecosystem of that time. As top predators members of the tribe had
a profound influence on the paleoenvironment, yet the evolution and diversification of this tribe are
unclear due to a lack of comprehensive revision and phylogenetic study. Here we describe a new dwarfed
ecomorph of Machairodontini, Taowu liui gen. et sp. nov., from the Early Pleistocene of northern China,
and carry out the best sampled phylogeny of the subfamily to date. Our analyses support that the African
Mio-Pleistocene Lokotunjailurus represents an early divergent group, convergent with the Amphimachairodus-Homotheriina lineage in dental traits. The derived Pliocene to Pleistocene subtribe
Homotheriina originated in Africa, from Adeilosmilus gen. nov. kabir or very a closely related taxon. Taowu
liui gen. et sp. nov. belongs to a sister clade to Homotheriina. The Plio-Pleistocene Homotheriina of the
New World belong to a monophyletic group in which Ischyrosmilus-Xenosmilus show a gradual adaptation to handling slow and powerful prey, whereas the true Homotherium only appeared after the
Middle Pleistocene, in a separate intercontinental dispersal event.
This article aims to show the interest of the work of Dr Jorge Morales on the understanding of African Ferae and Ruminantia collected in Uganda, Kenya and Namibia within the framework of collaboration with our team. This is not a revision of the systematics of these groups which is beyond the scope of the paper. Eighty taxa of Ferae are identified in the Cainozoic strata, of which thirty-nine are new. Seventeen ruminant taxa are recognised in the same deposits, of which eight are new.
A taxonomic revision of the mustelid carnivoran genus Eomellivora Zdansky, 1924 (= Perunium Orlov, 1947) is carried out. The genus is removed to the subfamily Mustelinae Fischer von Waldheim, 1817 (= Peruniinae Orlov, 1947). It consists of the single lineage or species Eomellivora wimani Zdansky, 1924 that evolved during the Late Miocene in Eurasia and North America. The characteristic feature in the evolution of this species was a progressive anteroposterior shortening and buccolingual broadening of the upper canines and the upper and lower premolars, as well as an increase in the massiveness of the lower canines, associated with a gradual augmentation in the number and size of the secondary cusps on the premolars. The species comprised the primitive Vallesian (early Late Miocene) chronosubspecies Eomellivora wimani piveteaui Ozansoy, 1965 known from Europe and the derived Turolian, Baodean, and Hemphillian (late Late Miocene) chronosubspecies Eomellivora wimani wimani Zdansky, 1924 occurring in Europe, Asia, and North America. The synonymy of Eomellivora wimani piveteaui includes Eomellivora liguritor Crusafont Pairó & Ginsburg, 1973, whereas that of Eomellivora wimani wimani contains Eomellivora californica Kretzoi, 1942, Eomellivora hungarica hungarica Kretzoi, 1942, Eomellivora hungarica altera Kretzoi, 1942, Perunium ursogulo Orlov, 1947, Eomellivora rumana Orlov, 1947, and Eomellivora orlovi Kretzoi, 1965. The species "Eomellivora" necrophila Pilgrim, 1932 and "Eomellivora" tenebrarum Pilgrim, 1932 are excluded from the genus Eomellivora.
Werdelin and Lewis (2000) recently described a new species of the saber-tooth genus Megantereon (Mammalia, Carnivora, Felidae) from Late Pliocene (∼3.5 Ma) deposits of the Nachukui Formation south of the Turkwel River in Turkana, northern Kenya (Ward et al., 1999). The new species, Megantereon ekidoit, is said to represent the earliest occurrence of this genus in Africa. It was described from a right mandibular ramus (KNM-St 23812) with i3–ml. As discussed below, the post-canine diastema is longer than the cheek-tooth row, since there does not appear to have been a third premolar (p3), and the coronoid process is relatively well developed, showing a hook-shaped morphology (Werdelin and Lewis, 2000: Fig. 1). The fourth premolar (p4) and the lower carnassial tooth (ml) show considerable wear.