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Pleistocene Big Cats
Freak Felids - A Discussion of History's Largest Felines
Freak Felids - A Discussion of History's Largest Felines
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Freak Felids - A Discussion of History's Largest Felines
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The issue with grouping sexes based on absolute size is that this specimen would either be a large female or a relatively small male compared to the two humeri, mandible, and femur.
The sagittal crest is very weak in the skull, like the right female Amur skull. Although, the Javan skulls that are proven to male also lack the prominent sagittal crest, so maybe this is a species specific trait and the vK skull is a small male. 
The tiger fossil is like the T. rex fossil, all relatively complete fossils were represented by the lesser specimens, while the truly large specimens' fossils were extremely fragmented.
I am suspecting the same case for the Wanhsien tiger, since a 35-36 cm skull looks like a cub skull. When the unknown skull of the adult male and the mandible from Manchuria, they all look gargantuan. The Ngandong tiger seems to have very large skull as well, but they are just a bit too fragmented. 
There are many points here:
1. The teeth for sale are probably models from the original fossil, and if you see them, none are larger than modern tigers (38.1 mm the largest one, probably in antero-posterior length). The seller is just exaggerating the piece, but the Pm4 itself (which is the largest of the two) is no larger than the modern ones from India and Russia. 2. The skulls of Sunda tigers have the characteristic that they have small of non-existent sagital crest, bu they have relative larger dentition and a narrow occiput. This is what I remember from J. H. Mazák facts. Judging by the size, the Ngandong tiger skull is from a large male, although not exceptional like the femur. 3. Interestingly, there is little variation between the female tigers on the entire territory, while there are more variations between males, specially on the size issue, this according with Dr Kitchener. In this case, there is little variation between an Indian, a Russian or a Chinese tigress skull, but in the case of males, the size and form differences are most dramatic. J. H. Mazák stated that in the case of the Amur tigers, the skulls of males and females are so different that it seems like if they were two different animals.
By judging the fact that the Watoealang specimen probably got a 18 inches skull, so a specimen with 15-16 inches skull is probably not 'large' anymore.
By then, the specimen with 480 mm femur is also not that 'exceptional' anymore.
Are these fossil materials belong to Panthera atrox?
 *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author
Here is the upper canine from the same specimen, it looks like a mixture between lion/tiger/jaguar, so I think it is definitely none other than Panthera atrox.
And the mandible is about 13 inches long, so I think we got a record specimen for Panthera atrox from the private collection.  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author
Either cave lion or American lion, their mandibles looks pretty much the same to me. Do you know where it was found?
The owner didn't specify the location of the fossil.
Anyway, it is already a new record specimen with a 330 mm mandible, so the GSL should be no less than 485 mm.
The largest P. atrox mandible I'm aware of is 318 mm, from a 467.5 mm GSL skull (CBL 424.3 mm). Could the owner take an image exactly above and normal to the mandible with a ruler for scale?
The fossil has been sold out, so I doubt he can scale the mandible anymore.
BTW, there are many instances of the private collection specimen surpasses the largest scientifically recorded specimen. So is this specimen Panthera spelaea or Panthera atrox? I am personally leaning toward atrox.
The coronoid process extends a good way past the condyloid process looking at the third image, so if there is no camera angle tricks it's more likely P. atrox or even P. fossilis, going by the latter's close relationship to the former. The traingular condyloid process is also a P. fossilis trait going by Sotnikova's two mandibles. P. atrox seems to have a rounder condyloid process looking from outside the mandible, but there are plenty of exceptions to this rule with pointed condyloid processes.
Panthera spelaea seems to be convergently evolved toward Panthera tigris, while Panthera atrox more convergently evolved Panthera onca.
I think this could be caused by the geographical proximity for these two species which both derived from the earlier Panthera fossilis.
Convergent evolution is a difficult aspect. In many ways, mostly regarding skull width, jaguars, P. spelaea, and tigers are similar while P. atrox and P. fossilis are more lion-like. Had the Javan tiger not existed one could even say the Ngandong skull was lion-like, but we know that modern Javan skulls are quite lion-like in their proportional width.
A lot of the skulls' features may have to do simply with the parent lineage, whose gene pool subsequently limits any adaptive change later on. I could post some skull pictures and we could analyze the differences and similarities.
Some Panthera atrox skulls also got very wide muzzle.
For example, the specimen 2900-3 got 141.4 mm at the width across the canines, while its GSL is about 458 mm.
Furthermore, here is some interesting speculation about those black colored fossils.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernozem So those black colored fossils can only be derived from the Eastern Europe, Southern Siberia, Manchuria (Northeast China), Western North America. That's why some tiger and Panthera atrox fossils were also black colored. |
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