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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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Sorry everyone, I miss a lot of alerts as they get backlogged. Please PM me if I have missed a mention.
The Ngandong tiger is probably around 120 cm when mounted in anatomical position. It's proximal AP diameter is abnormally long so it may have been proportionately longer. The Watualang mandible is 254 mm with the anterior symphysis and coronoid process missing. Probably 260 to 270 mm complete. P. t. soloensis is probably no longer a taxonomically accurate name as naming conventions evolve, or rather become more strict. You'll notice Hertler et al. don't use anything but P. tigris. From Brongersma: "The fossil form seems, however, to reach a much greater size than the recent Javanese subspecies, and it is not at all improbable that it will have to be retained as a distinct subspecies, which then should be known as Panthera tigris groeneveldtii (Dubois). Probably the larger specimens described as F. palaeojavanica were the males, the smaller ones described by Von Koenigswald as Felis tigris soloensis females." Dubois got there first is the general idea behind the above. The Bornean specimen will likely never get subspecific classification as long as studies keep indicating a recent divergence date of subspecies if any subspecies classification is worth it at all. It is similar to how we loosely classify P. spelaea.  (01-14-2022, 06:43 AM)tigerluver Wrote: The Watualang mandible is 254 mm with the anterior symphysis and coronoid process missing. Probably 260 to 270 mm complete. In this case, guessing that the mandible is about 265 mm long, we can try to reconstruct its size compared to other modern tigers. I got a sample of 58 skulls with an asociated mandible (39 are from wild specimens), all of them males and from different subspecies/populations. This is the result:  *This image is copyright of its original author As we can see, there is an strong relation between the length of the mandible and the greatest skull length. Now, if we use only wild specimens, this is the result:  *This image is copyright of its original author We can check that the difference in the relation is minimal and it is known that tiger skulls do not have a great variation in captivity like, for example, the lions. However, there is a peak there that is creting problems and that is the skull reported by Baikov, with a GSL of 400 mm but a mandible length of only 240 mm. Mazák (2013) mentioned that is posible that this skull was incorrectly measured or that Baikov measured the mandible in another form that the one that Zoologist do. So I remouved this specimen and check what happen:  *This image is copyright of its original author When we remouve this outliner value the relation is even stronger, so we can safetilly use the mandible length to estimate the GL of the skull in male tigers. The other outliner (not as dramatic as the other) in the graphic is the large skull of 370 mm in GSL and only 230 mm in ML, that based in DNA it came from Malaysia (Heino et al., 2018). Using the equation generated by Excel, using only the wild specimens, and excluding the skull reported by Baikov, we can estimate a GSL of about 393 mm for the mandible from Watualangat, which is larger than the complete skull found in Ngandong (something that was pointed out by others already) but is still smaller than the huge skull of 406 mm reported (not measured) by Mazák. Now, there is something interesting. When I use only the skulls for the Amur tigers, I got this result:  *This image is copyright of its original author The correlation is strong but not as much as the overall sample, but what happen when I remouve the captive specimens and the Baikov record? Check this:  *This image is copyright of its original author The result is that we have one of the strongest correlations on record and also indirectly we can see that the value of the mandible in the giant skull reported by Mazák did match the other ones, adding points to its reliability. What can I conclude on this? Using the mandible length we can get a reliable for to estimate the size of the skull in male tigers, also that while the skull reported by Baikov seems to have errors, the one reported by Mazák seems to be more reliable at the light of values. And finally that the mandible from Watualang came from an specimen that was bigger than those from Ngandong, at exception of the one with the big femur. 
@GuateGojira Just wanted to hear your opinion on the Bornear Tiger from Pleistocene. Weren't the fossils too fragmented? Also can we safely say that the Bornean Tiger completely dwarfed all other felines that we know of??
And do you have any size estimates? Like length, height and weight of the Bornean Tiger? Was it significantly bigger than all the other giant species or was the size difference not that big? (01-16-2022, 08:17 AM)LonePredator Wrote: @GuateGojira Just wanted to hear your opinion on the Bornear Tiger from Pleistocene. Weren't the fossils too fragmented? Also can we safely say that the Bornean Tiger completely dwarfed all other felines that we know of?? Well, although the fossil is actually just a fragment of mandible, that is not impediment for Paleontologist to estimate the size of extint animals. The great advantage here is that this is an animal that we actually know (is a regular tiger, just that much bigger), so we can use modern specimens to estimate its size and weight in a reliable form. To say that this tiger dwarfed all other modern and prehistoric cats in history is to risky, as we will need to make more studies. For the moment, the largest cat (body dimentions) that I know is the cave "lion" Panthera spelaea fossilis, represented by the huge skull of 484.7 mm in greatest length (the biggest skull for any felid at this moment) and the heaviest cat will be Smilodon populator, which certainly surpassed the 400 kg, using the specimen housed in Paris. So, probably this giant Pleistocene tiger from Borneo could match them in size and weight. I still don't make any size estimation for this specimen, but based in the study Sherani (2019) this is certainly the biggest fossil tiger at this moment, with an estimated body mass of C.480 kg, although personally I think that the figure of 427.8 kg, based in the mandible length (check the paper for details) is the more reliable one.
Mandible length of fragment is affected by allometry. The "mandible length" measurement in the tiger paper is not the same as complete mandible length. Rather, you will see that as the mandible size increased, the surrogate "mandible length" comprises proportionately less and less of the total mandible. In other words, positive allometry. Here is a visual:
 *This image is copyright of its original author The larger specimens have a shorter horizontal ramus and surrogate mandible length compared to total mandible length. You will see here that comparison of the surrogate "mandible length" between 1a and 3a will underestimate 3a by a massive 17% (65/76). Therefore, the clean isometric relation of total mandible length does not apply. This is why height and width dimensions of the ramus are important, as there is less allometric effect on estimation theoretically when we pool together many measurements. This is also probably why multiple measurements are used in the estimate, to make up for this error. It is important to know these allometric relationships before choosing a single measurement as "most accurate" as clearly, the surrogate mandible length has hefty underestimation. The comparative specimen used to estimate via mandible length is very small. As such, using a scale factor of 3 would underestimate the mass as the actual scale factor is greater than 3. It may happen in time that the Christiansen estimations show to be underestimates across the board. The database is measured from digital photos, which can result in measurements a bit exaggerated as compared to in person measurements. This underestimates any specimen not also measured digitally. 
After hearing about the 475 mm Panthera spelaea skull, is it possible that it's actually larger than P. atrox?
made by me
(Note: Models do not belong to me.  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author
Not one of the largest but large regardless
The Iberian record of the puma-like cat Puma pardoides (Owen, 1846) (Carnivora, Felidae) Abstract Fossil puma-like cats (Puma pardoides) are recorded from several Late Pliocene to Early Pleistocene Eurasian localities, but the interpretation of the phylogenetic relationships between them and the extant puma (Puma concolor) remains controversial. In the past, extinct puma-like cats have been classified into several genera and species, and a close relationship with both pumas (Puma concolor) and snow leopards (Uncia uncia) has been suggested. Here, we describe the fossil remains of puma-like cats from the Iberian Peninsula. These remains (from the localities of La Puebla de Valverde, Cueva Victoria and Vallparadís) cover the whole known chronological distribution of this species in Eurasia. Although there are dentognathic similarities with U. uncia, the Iberian remains of P. pardoides most closely resemble the extant P. concolor. It is concluded that P. pardoides is closely related to living pumas, which supports a likely Eurasian origin of the puma lineage. 1. Introduction Pumas (also known as cougars or mountain lions) are classified into the species Puma concolor (Linnaeus, 1771), which is distributed though the American continent. Nonetheless, there are also puma-like fossil remains recorded throughout Eurasia (Hemmer et al., 2004), which following Hemmer (2001), we attribute to Puma pardoides (Owen, 1846) (Owen, 1846)—although in the past, they were generally attributed to Panthera schaubi Viret, 1954 (Viret, 1954), and even a new genus, Viretailurus Hemmer, 1964 (Hemmer, 1964), was erected on their basis. Unfortunately, these remains are very scarce, so that the anatomy of these middle-sized carnivores is poorly known and its phylogenetic status (and, by implication, taxonomic attribution) remains uncertain. Following Wilson and Reeder (Wilson and Reeder, 2005), we include the genus Puma Jardine, 1834 in the subfamily Felinae, although other authors include it into the Pantherinae (Wilson and Reeder, 2005). In this article, we describe the unpublished dentognathic remains of P. pardoides from the Spanish Early Pleistocene sites of Cueva Victoria and Vallparadís, as well as the mandibular and postcranial remains from the Late Pliocene of La Puebla de Valverde (which had been previously mentioned, but not figured or described in detail (Kurtén and Crusafont-Pairó, 1977)). Besides providing a detailed comparison with extant pumas, we also compare this fossil material with extant snow leopards, Uncia uncia (Schreber, 1775), given the fact that similarities with this species have been noted in some puma-like fossil material from Saint-Vallier (Olive, 2006). Finally, the implications of Eurasian puma-like cats for the understanding of the origins of extant pumas are also discussed from a paleobiogeographic viewpoint. 3. Systematic palaeontology  *This image is copyright of its original author Measurements:  *This image is copyright of its original author Fossil Remains:  *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 4. Discussion 4.1. Taxonomic remarks Until recently, Eurasian puma-like fossil remains were still attributed to P. schaubi (Turner and Antón, 1997), which was originally described on the basis of material Saint-Vallier (France; ca. 2.1 Ma) (Viret, 1954). Soon later, however, Hemmer (1964) showed that this material was clearly not pantherine, but displayed many shared features with the American puma, and on this basis erected the genus Viretailurus. Further similarities in dental dimensions and the position of mental foramina between this species and fossil American pumas were remarked by Kurtén (1976), while Sotnikova (1976) similarly noted that the material from Central Asia attributed to Felis (Puma) sp. also displayed similarities with this European species. It was not until the paper by Kurtén and Crusafont-Pairó (1977), describing the carnivore remains from La Puebla de Valverde, that the similarities between the above-mentioned species and Felis pardoides Owen (1846), originally described from the English Red Crags, were noticed. Most recently, Hemmer (2001) described the puma-like remains from the Epivillafranchian of Untermassfeld, and concluded that Viretailurus Hemmer, 1964 and Panthera schaubi Viret, 1954 were junior subjective synonyms of Puma Jardine, 1834 and Puma pardoides (Owen, 1846), respectively. 4.2. The Eurasian record of puma-like cats In the Iberian Peninsula, P. pardoides is first recorded at the MN17 locality of La Puebla de Valverde (Kurtén and Crusafont-Pairó, 1977), on the basis of the remains described in this paper. P. pardoides is also recorded in the Early Pleistocene site of Cueva Victoria (ca. 1.1 Ma, according to (Blain et al., 2008) and references therein). Finally, as shown in this paper, P. pardoides is also recorded from the late Early Pleistocene site of Vallparadís in Terrassa (Barcelona, Spain; (Alba et al., 2008)). An estimated age of more than 0.8 Ma has been proposed for this locality (Alba et al., 2008), so that it might represent the youngest citation of this species from the Iberian Peninsula. P. pardoides had not yet been recognized from the Vallparadís assemblage when the preliminary faunal list from this locality was published (Alba et al., 2008). Outside of the Iberian Peninsula, P. pardoides is recorded from the MN16b of Perrier-Étouaires (Hugueney et al., 1989) and the MN17 of Saint-Vallier (Vislobokova et al., 1993; Argant, 2004) in France; the MN16b or MN17 locality of Newborn, Red Crags in Great Britain (Owen, 1846; Hemmer et al., 2004); Untermassfeld (above the base of the Jaramillo chron, ca. 1 Ma) in Germany (Hemmer, 2001); probably Stránská skála (late Early Pleistocene) in the Czech Republic (Hemmer, 2001); possibly from the MN17 locality of Varshets in Bulgaria (Spassov, 2000); the MN16 site of Kvabebi in Georgia (Hemmer et al., 2004); and the Early Villafranchian localities of Shamar and Beregovaya in Mongolia (Sotnikova, 1976), which respectively correspond to the MN16a and MN16b (Vislobokova et al., 1993). Additional puma-like fossil remains have been described from the localities of Vallonnet (Jaramillo chron, ca. 1 Ma) (Moullé, 1992) in France and Tegelen (MN17) in The Netherlands (Hemmer, 2001), although their attribution to P. pardoides remains doubtful (Moullé et al., 2006; O’Regan and Turner, 2004). Recently, Petrucci (Petrucci, 2008) has noted that an ulna and a fifth metacarpal from the Early Pleistocene locality of Pirro Nord in Italy resemble puma-like cats in both size and morphology, although he formally attributes them to “Felidae indet. (Puma size)”. 3. Attribution of the Iberian material The Iberian specimens of P. pardoides from La Puebla de Valverde, Cueva Victoria and Vallparadís display many dentognathic similarities to the extant P. concolor; these include: (1) the location of the three mental foramina; (2) the position of the masseteric fossa, reaching the level of the m1 protoconid; (3) p3 with a well-developed anterior accessory cusp, more protruding than the posterior cusp; (4) p4 with symmetrical protoconid (in lateral view), and well-developed and similarly-sized accessory cusps; and (5) m1 with a protoconid slightly larger and higher than the paraconid, and quite vertically oriented. With regard to the postcranial material, the Iberian fossil remains are almost entirely comparable to extant pumas on morphological grounds, except for a general greater robusticity and a slightly larger size (near the maximum values of the extant species). The Iberian remains described in this paper also display several similarities to extant U. uncia: (1) stoutly-built lower mandibular corpus; (2) number and position of the mental foramina; (3) masseteric fossa reaching the level of the m1 protoconid, in lateral view; (4) p3 with a welldeveloped, circular parastylid that is more protruding than the posterior accessory cuspid; and (5) p4 with a symmetrical protoconid in lateral view and with two well-developed and similarly-sized accessory cuspids. Nevertheless, the Iberian remains further differ from U. uncia by several other features, namely: (1) m1 protoconid slightly larger and more protruding than the paraconid, with a small cuspid at the base of the protoconid and, in some cases, a lingual bulge between the two main cuspids; (2) lower values of the mandibular robusticity index; and (3) relatively short and robust femur. Additional comparisons with Early Pliocene European felids, such as the machairodont Dinofelis Zdansky, 1924, would be interesting, especially given some poscranial similarities—Dinofelis displays a forelimb morphology convergent with that of pantherines (Werdelin and Lewis, 2001). Unfortunately, the scarce European remains of this genus (Werdelin and Lewis, 2001) prevent a correct comparison with the material of P. pardoides reported here. To sum up, the Iberian fossil remains described in this paper displaymany similarities to the extant P. concolor and the fossil P. pardoides from Saint-Vallier, while they can be distinguished from U. uncia on both dental and postcranial grounds. As such, we attribute the puma-like remains described in this paper to P. pardoides, albeit noting that, to some regards, the dental remains from Cueva Victoria and Vallparadís more closely resemble extant pumas than P. pardoides from Saint-Vallier and La Puebla de Valverde. 4.4. Paleobiogeographic implications The evolutionary origins of the puma lineage are far from being definitively settled. It has been previously argued that the cheetah-like cat lineage of Miracinonyx Adams, 1979 and the puma lineage might have shared a last common ancestor in the Middle to Late Pliocene of America (Johnson et al., 2006), thus implying an American origin of the genus Puma. However, this is not supported by paleontological evidence, because the fossil record of P. concolor in the American continent begins at around 400 ka (Van Valkenburgh et al., 1990). On the contrary, the presence of puma-like cats in Eurasia deserves further consideration regarding the origins of American pumas from a phylogenetic and biogeographic viewpoint. The puma-like cat P. pardoides is recorded from western Europe to central Asia from the MN16 until the MN17, and hereafter this taxon is not recorded (with the possible exception of the scarce remains from Pirro Nord) until above the base of the Jaramillo chron in Untermassfeld and several other sites. The chronology of P. pardoides in the Iberian Peninsula also ranges from the Late Pliocene to the latest Early Pleistocene, thus coinciding with the range of the species elsewhere in Eurasia. The disappearance of P. pardoides from the Eurasian fossil record occurs at the Early/Middle Pleistocene boundary, coinciding with the arrival of leopards into this continent, which became a common element from the late Middle to the Late Pleistocene (Palombo et al., 2008). This suggests that, if the Eurasian P. pardoides and the extant P. concolor are indeed closely related, the former must have dispersed across the Bering Strait during the Middle Pleistocene, before its first record in the American continent (Van Valkenburgh et al., 1990). Given the 400 kyr gap between the last European record of puma-like cats and their first American record, it may be hypothesized that pumas inhabited northern Asia during the early Middle Pleistocene, before dispersing into America. A revision of the Asian fossil material would be required in order to decipher whether puma-like remains have been incorrectly determined due to their similarities with leopards and snow leopards. Unfortunately, this issue is further complicated by the uncertainties surrounding the origin of the snow leopard, U. uncia. Its fossil record is very scarce, and only a few citations from the Late Pleistocene Altai Caves are probably correct (Hemmer, 1972). The recent assignment by Hemmer (2003) of a mandible from the Middle Pleistocene Aragó Cave to Uncia uncia was disputed by Testu (2006), who assigned it to Panthera sp. On the other hand, Olive (2006) noted the presence of derived features of U. uncia in the puma-like cranium QSV 136 from Saint-Vallier. The presence of these exclusive snow leopard characters in the Saint-Vallier cranium further implies that puma-like Eurasian cats might be also closely related to the former. Studies of molecular phylogeny are not conclusive to this regard. It has been recently concluded that U. uncia and P. leo may be sister taxa (Wei et al., 2008), but other analyses have alternatively concluded that the former is a stem member of the Panthera clade (Johnson et al., 2006), that it is a close relative of P. tigris (Linnaeus, 1758) (Jae-Heup et al., 2001), or that it is the sister taxon of P. pardus (Yu and Zhang, 2005). Most of these studies also support a close relationship between P. concolor and Acinonyx pardinensis with the exclusion of the snow leopard (Johnson et al., 2006), thus further complicating the phylogenetic interpretation of Eurasian puma-like cats that share morphological features with both extant pumas and snow leopards. 5. Conclusions The Iberian record of the enigmatic, Eurasian felid Puma pardoides includes in the localities of La Puebla de Valverde (MN17), Cueva Victoria (base of the Jaramillo subchron) and Vallparadís (below the Brunhes-Matuyama boundary). The Iberian specimens share many dentognathic features with those from Saint-Vallier (France), and further closely resemble the extant Puma concolor, even though the fossil specimens are clearly more robust both cranially and poscranially, and closer in size to the maximum figures of the extant species. Although the material described in this paper shares cranial and poscranial features with the snow leopard (Uncia uncia), it can be distinguished from the latter on the basis of significant dentognathic characters. Despite some recent claims on the phylogenetic significance of these similarities between the Old World puma-like cats and snow leopards, the lack of fossil remains from the latter preclude an accurate deciphering of their affinities. On the other hand, the puma-like fossil remains described in this paper significantly contribute to our understanding of the evolutionary history of the puma lineage. In particular, they confirm that Eurasian puma-like cats (Puma pardoides) are indeed closely related to American pumas (Puma concolor), further showing that Eurasian pumas are recorded from the Late Pliocene until the latest Early Pleistocene. Overall, from a paleobiogeographic viewpoint, this is consistent with the puma lineage having originated in Eurasia.
@tigerluver @GuateGojira @GrizzlyClaws
I have some great news for you, you know Randomdinos right? The skeletal artist famous for his theropod hrandi works like Sue the tyrannosaurus. Well, it must be said that he finally did his first mammalian skeletal and who could he choose if not the Smilodon populator!  *This image is copyright of its original author https://www.deviantart.com/randomdinos/a...-910991830 I am very impressed with how the height at the shoulder is around 130cm, a height we have never heard of for this feline as we mentioned it looks like the very famous "1.2m" as shoulder height. It goes without saying that I am very curious about the future dorsal view of the feline and its GDI. Who knows how much it could change from the estimate of 436 kg (03-26-2022, 01:17 PM)LoveAnimals Wrote: @tigerluver @GuateGojira @GrizzlyClaws What a beautiful reconstruction, is amazing how big it this animal was. I love it! And let's take in count that the black silouete in the background is just suggestive of the minimum musculature, so this animal could be even more massive than what the image suggest. So, I think that a body mass of about 450 kg seems not out of question, surpassing any modern or prehistoric Panthera member! (03-27-2022, 12:18 AM)GuateGojira Wrote: . So, I think that a body mass of about 450 kgWhile I really hope of a such high estimate, I doubt it was actually that heavy. Now estomating without a dorsal view is useless, but I've been doing a comparison between this cat and the GDIed 434 kg smilodon  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author Maybe it's just me, but I guess that the new version seems a bit wankier than the previous one, I guess it looks more like 400 kgish. But again, visual estimates are useless until we don't see a dorsal view (03-27-2022, 12:08 PM)LoveAnimals Wrote:Quote:. So, I think that a body mass of about 450 kgWhile I really hope of a such high estimate, I doubt it was actually that heavy. Now estomating without a dorsal view is useless, but I've been doing a comparison between this cat and the GDIed 434 kg smilodon In order to avoid confusions and missunderstandings in the future, I suggest you to quote the entire phrase and not only a part of it. I did not stated that I think that this particular new specimen weighed 450 kg, I said (and I quote myself) that: "I think that a body mass of about 450 kg seems not out of question, surpassing any modern or prehistoric Panthera member!" That is a different statement, and is only suggesting that estimations of up to that figure could be plausible. Now, returing to the point, a GDE estimation, like Tigerluver explained before, is problematic and arbitrary en many senses, as we need a tridimentional point of view of the animal and honestly the upper view of the specimen used in that calculation that you quoted it looks more like a large modern tiger-lion than a Smilodon. The Smilodon species, especifically fatalis and populator, were massive and wide in its body, check that even for the biggest S. fatalis which measured about 180 cm in body length and 100 cm in height (average for a modern lion), already weighed up to 280 kg (more than the biggest modern tiger), so they were very stocky and that image reflect it but just partially. Also, as far I remember randomdinos once explained that the black silouete in his images represents the basic musculature, not a maximum or minimum. So that same specimen with a little of more musculature and fat will definitelly weight more. Finaly, we need to remember that all the body masses of prehistoric animals are estimations based in formulas which results may vary depening of the methods and sources of its data, so we need to be careful and not take it like the last true. However based in its size and massivenes we can say that Smilodon populator did surpassed the 400 kg and certainly is one, of not, the heaviest felid of all times (for the moment....).
I was thinking about our perspective about how massive was Smilodon and it came to my mind the beautifull reconstructions of Mauricio Anton, like this one of Smilodon fatalis:
 *This image is copyright of its original author The image is beautiful and it shows how powerfull and majestic this animal was, however it keep the basic proportions of the modern Panthera cats and if you chose a modern cat like this tiger and lion:  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author We can see that there is not to much difference and that is not what the bones suggest. Smilodon, both fatalis and populator, were cats that did not look like cats, they look more like bears in some points, so they probably look more compact, massive and less gracil. I found this reconstruction from "Tio Joako" and "Palaeos" and it shows this morphology:  *This image is copyright of its original author Yes, I know that is not as pretty as the other one, but independently of how beautifull are the images of Anton, his Smilodon looks too gracile, to Panthera, so even his Smilodon populator do not look as massive as should be:  *This image is copyright of its original author So, we need to remember that while Smilodon was a felid, its morphology was different from modern cats and even at similar sizes, they weighed significantly more. Again, for example, Smilodon fatalis barely reached the size of an average sized modern lion, but weighed more than the biggest modern tiger recorded, that suggest to us how massive was his southern brother. In this case, S. populator could look like this (made by "DiBgd"):  *This image is copyright of its original author A massive brute, heavy and not particularly fast but strong enoght to fight with megabeasts in the Pleistocene. |
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