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ON THE EDGE OF EXTINCTION - B - THE LION (Panthera leo)
ON THE EDGE OF EXTINCTION - B - THE LION (Panthera leo)
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ON THE EDGE OF EXTINCTION - B - THE LION (Panthera leo)
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 (10-06-2018, 11:34 PM)GuateGojira Wrote:(09-20-2018, 11:15 AM)johnny rex Wrote: I have contacted the owner of the skull cast of Lionzilla about the skull itself through a taxidermy forum, Lionzilla is not the Extra large lion skull from Bone Clones. She informed me that she measured Lionzilla skull with calipers without the lower jaw with overall score equal to 28 inches or 710 mm. Yeah, she measured the mold only. She continued in her latest reply, the measurement of the skull cast in the original ebay page is more accurate than the measurement of the mold because she said mold especially if it is made of silicone can become deformed when handled. This is her latest message to me "Measuring from the mold definitely will add or subtract a half centimeter or maybe more, as it is harder to measure especially length wise due to the way the mold is separated. Molds, being made of silicone, can also deform a bit when handled. I do know that the measurement on the listing was made directly from the cast so it is the more accurate of the two." Its length is around the length of record size lion skull, but the width is questionable. 
@GuateGojira , could you tell me why don't you believe the 272kg male lion in Kenya?
 *This image is copyright of its original author Records of modern lion in southeastern Europe Red: excavated lion remains[2][13][14][15]Orange: locations mentioned by ancient Greek authors[16][17][18][19][3][20] Yellow: locations mentioned in Greek legendshttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_lions_in_Europe#/media/File:Modern_lion_locations_in_southeastern_Europe_except_Caucasus.png  (10-07-2018, 08:09 PM)Smilodon-Rex Wrote: @GuateGojira , could you tell me why don't you believe the 272kg male lion in Kenya? Full answer this Saturday! Stay tunned. 
(10-07-2018, 08:09 PM)Smilodon-Rex Wrote: @GuateGojira , could you tell me why don't you believe the 272kg male lion in Kenya? On the 272 kg lion from Kenya: Here is your answer @Smilodon-Rex: At this point, I think that is futile to dispute the existence of the record of 272 for the Kenya lion, so actually I do believe in the record now and like I say, with modern scientific books quoting the figure, there is no point to continue the discussion.
However that was NOT the case in the past years (since 2008 and until 2014, as far I remember). In fact, there is a long history behind this record, with random emails, books, discussions and even the drama-queen of Waveriders making dozens of posts regarding this with no specific result or apparent point. So here is a small appreciation about the case, not as long and redundant as that of Wave, but a short “straight to the point” one.
1. The record:
The undisputed original source of this record is the book of Nowell & Jackson “Wild Cats” from 1996. The record occupied less than two lines:
 *This image is copyright of its original author So, this is when the record saw the light. Also, there was another independent source showing the record of 272 kg from the part of Peterhans & Gnoske (2001) talking about this lion, but they don’t present them source, so probably they saw it personally or the document/paper/sheet where it was stated:
 *This image is copyright of its original author Normally this last source was ignored or discarded, to be honest.
Well, at the end this was all, two independent sources regarding the record, one with no source and the other just an “in litt.” label.
2. The corroboration:
However, when some people started to investigate the record, they received mixed emails from, apparently, the same person. Two posters, “Tigerlover” and “Boldchamp” (another poster too, but I don’t remember his/her name), said that they wrote to Mr Richard Kock (the person that killed the lion) and the emails from them showed that Dr Kock did not even remembered the record, at the beginning at least. Latter Kock said to “Tigerlover” that the record was accurate but the weight includes some stomach content, although he apparently said to “Boldchamp” that the weight was empty. At the end, this was all what we had, mixed communications with contradictory answers, and I based all my statements on this conversations and those from the Kenya Wildlife Service (I will discuss this latter).
Here is the email to “Tigerlover”:
 *This image is copyright of its original author Waveriders accused him of fraud, but it is not fair to attack a person that can’t defend himself. As far I know, “Tigerlover” was a reliable poster.
Here is the email to “Boldchamp”:
 *This image is copyright of its original author Two emails, apparently from the same person (Kock) but completelly diferrent conclusions. It was imposible to no doubt of all the thing.
Latter "Boldchamp" contacted the personal of the Kenya Wildlife Service and check what he got:
 *This image is copyright of its original author Also, Dr Bruce Patterson in his book “The Lions of Tsavo” quote this lion of 230 kg (506 lb) as the heaviest recorded in Kenya:
 *This image is copyright of its original author This is the email from Mr Bernard Ngoru to “Boldchamp” regarding the weights of that sample of lions:
 *This image is copyright of its original author Finally, Dr Yamaguchi, a lion expert/fan, did not even mention the record:
 *This image is copyright of its original author Waveriders created many excuses regarding why this experts did not quoted the figure, that actually don’t have any base, apart from his own biased perception; in the case of Dr Yamaguchi he said that he did not mentioned the 272 kg weight because he wanted to use only specimens from large samples, but that is only his personal idea, with no backup on it and easily discarded. Is still a “mystery” why the record of 272 kg lion was not mentioned by them, by the way. Did he (Dr Yamaguchi) know something that we don’t? At this point, is irrelevant.
So if the authorities of the Kenya Wildlife Service and Dr Patterson (which apparently also investigated this record too) do not quoted or mentioned the record (again two independent sources, but related this time), was possible that the figure was incorrect and unreliable? Nowell & Jackson (1996) did make some errors in the book regarding the sizes of other specimens (incorrect conversions with the leopard weights and the copy/paste of the tiger sizes of Mazák, ignoring that included captive specimens), so there was a little possibility that the lion figure was somewhat incorrect. Knowing the lack of information regarding this record and the contradictory information regarding the emails of Mr Kock, this suggested that something was wrong in the record. So, that was our position for many years.
3. The pictures:
As you can see, there was a point in the assumption that something was "not good" on the record, and I even though in a moment that maybe those records (230 kg and 272 kg) were the same animal, thinking that maybe the figure of 230 kg was with an empty stomach, but that idea did not had too much support.
Now with the arrival of Waveriders at this forum and after that, the begining of his great apostasy – the great fight, the ban to him, and finally when he decided to post against this forum, @“peter” “and me in Carnivora – he started a disgusting, huuuuuuuge, boring and incredibly redounding post in Carnivora forum (the old one that is closed now) where he shared all his hate and his biased ideas. About the post regarding measurements methods, some people appreciated the pictures of the books and the emails that he posted, but certainly all people could see that his main point was to attack us and even his use of “sexual” insults (I have the screenshot to prove it, but is not relevant to the topic) put in doubt his accuracy and professionalism, well IF you think that a person that never showed his name, that put random pictures with no face, is actually a "professional".
At the end, he included a series of post about a “defamation case" against Kock, Nowell and Jackson, copy/pasting specific parts of very old discussions, taking them out of context and creating a case where he constantly used insults, black humor, and a great defamation against Peter and I (I will discuss this latter in this post). At the end of that series of nonsenses, where he only showed HIS personal and particular point of view (not the crystal clear true, as he claimed), the only good thing is that he finally presented a series of pictures (take by him/her?) where he showed what is apparently the specimen “NMK OM 7935” which is the one of 272 kg:
 *This image is copyright of its original author Under the assumption that these pictures are real, it seems that this is the specimen so long referred and also, apparently, the pink paper card is the last and only evidence that this lion weighed 272 kg. Also, it is clear again that this lion was a “cattle-eater” and this is a very important point that I will discuss at the end.
4. Crystal clear?
This part, although not so relevant to the post, is important to understand the context of the case.
As you can see, the “published” evidence says that Dr Richard Kock shot a male lion of 272 kg was near Mount Kenya in 1993, that it was post-prime but with a healthy skull and that was a cattle-eater (Nowell & Jackson, 1993; Peterhans & Gnoske, 2001). This is all what we actually know of this record, and that is it, the pictures of the skull and the pink card corroborate that the specimen existed, that the figure of 272 kg is the correct and that the it was very healty, according with its dentition. However, regarding the emails which are focused in the “stomach content”, is like a matter of “faith”, as we never can know if the person that post them is reliable or not, and in this case, I don’t believe in Wave at all, so his claim that the lion was “dissected and found with a stomach virtually (technically) empty” is completely arbitrary as there is no evidence published on this. Now, this is what Waveriders concluded on the limited information:
 *This image is copyright of its original author Certainly, although somewhat accurate, this is just his personal summary, mainly based on his supposed personal communication with Mr Kock. The problem is that he invented the term “technically empty”, which is not in any publication available in the web that I have saw or read, just to justify that the animal was “empty” in lato sensu, which is something that we actually don’t know according with the official publications or the pink card in the photo. Also, the fact that the lion was attacking (according with one of the email) is no evidence that the lion was “hungry” (lions can attack for many reasons and this was nor a normal lion), for the contrary, is well known that the cats can hunt and kill even when they already had food on the stomach. Schaller (1972) recorded this case with a lion:
 *This image is copyright of its original author As we can see, this lion ate 33 kg of food in one sit and he could eat more if had not a previous stomach content before eating. Also check that the food intake of lions and tigers is the same, by the way.
Also, we know what a “cattle-eater” behavior can cause to a tiger weight, according with Wood (1978) and his investigation:
 *This image is copyright of its original author Also interesting, Waveriders accused many people of “defame” the scientists Kock, Nowell and Jackson, just because we doubted of the figure, specifically “this” particular figure, not the entire book, not even the article about the lion. Other posters like “Chui” also criticized the book regarding the leopard section, but Wave ignored this event. It seems that Wave don’t know that criticize a book is NOT defame, for example Dr Sunquist made an error quoting a head-body length of 290 cm for the Amur tiger in his book “Wild Cats of the World” and Dr Luke Hunter made other errors quoting the “old” head-body lengths of 190 cm for leopard, 250 cm for lion and 300 cm for tiger in his book of 2015. However, according with Wave, we can’t complain of this and we must swallow this figures without any critic, unless of course that the record favors the tiger as in that case it must be put on doubt and “defamation” is mandatory.
We can believe in the information quoted in the books and corroborated by the pictures of the pink card related with the specimen, but certainly we can’t believe blindly on the conclusions of Wave that the lion was “empty” or “technically empty” if is not published, this is how Waveriders works so is fair to treat him in the same form.
5. Conclusion:
The only conclusion that we can get is that the lion existed, that it weighed 272 kg, was killed because it was a cattle eater and was done near Mount Kenya. However, all other conclusion out of this specific information is pure speculation and must not be taken in count. In fact, the only information quoted in the scientific documents now is the paragraph of Nowell & Jackson (1996) and that is all, the book of Hunter (2015) “Wild cats of the world” and the one of Sunquist & Sunquist (2014) “The Wild Cat Book” only quotes the figure of 272 kg, but with no other details.
However, if you ask me which is the “heaviest free-ranging felid accurately and reliably ever weighed by scientists reported in scientific literature and/or made public to date”, that certainly will be the Sauraha male tiger “M105” from Chitwan NP at Nepal, not only because he also weighed 272 kg in his final capture (or c.260 kg adjusted for stomach content, although there is a possibility that he was not baited in the last capture, thanks to his previous radio-collar), but also because we know his life since it was first captured in December 31 of 1974, he was observed and studied by several scientists like Dr Sunquist, Dr Smith and Dr Seidensticker, amount others, we have pictures of him when roaming free and also with people for size comparison, we know his body measurements and how was measured too (thanks to Dr Sunquist) and the most important of all, the Sauraha male was not a “cattle eater”. This is important because cattle eaters are abnormally fat and there is a reason to think that the “NMK OM 7935” lion was in that condition according with its behaviour (this is just speculation of course, but based in reports of cattle eater lions, tigers and jaguars). On the other hand, the Sauraha male has been described as an outsized massive specimen, with rippled muscles and seems that he don’t had an ounce of fat, a huge animal so confident that he would walk his favorite paths in broad light. He was a territorial male for about 6 years and sired no fewer than 51 cubs! (Sunquist & Sunquist, 1988; Mills, 2004; Seidensticker & Lumpkin, 2004).
Check the skull of the Sauraha male:
 *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author Now you can compare it with the NMK OM 7935 lion skull, the TWO specimens are masive!
At the end, the final conclusion is up to the reader and, I afraid, also related to what animal he/she likes the most. Hope this helps to your knowledge. I don't know how Waveriders is going to react to this post, specially with his aggresive behaviour and grudge against me and this forum, but I think that is fair to present my point of view, specially if someone is asking a question.
Greetings.
 (10-14-2018, 05:51 AM)GuateGojira Wrote:(10-07-2018, 08:09 PM)Smilodon-Rex Wrote: @GuateGojira , could you tell me why don't you believe the 272kg male lion in Kenya? I would say that much, that when looking emails of this Richard Kock, I don´t see there any dramatic contradiction. He is saying actually quite same thing with a little bit different words. In both emails he basically say, that stomach was empty or at least very close to it and it looks like he kept content of it quite insignificant, because he didn´t explain it more closely. If we can keep him as legit researcher, then most probable conclusion is ( I think), that if he would have kept stomach content to be essential part of weight of this lion, then he would have mentioned it. A few kilos difference between some weighings can be caused even by that, that different people do weighings with different scales and it is pretty impossible to know always how accurate scales are used and how often those are checked. So this lion could have been maybe anything from 267-277 kg:s for instance if we do believe in that, that Kocker is legit researcher who did his best there. Who knows how many emails Kocker has received about that lion and how busy he has been (or fed up) when answering, so I can´t blame him if he sometimes reply, that empty and sometime practically empty. At least it looks like Kocker actually have checked it because able to say, that just a little there and kept it most probably quite meaningless. I think, that more relevant issue is credibility of Kocker overall. If he is credible, then without a doubt, that lion was very big one. Epaiva seems to have some experience actually being on field. If you read this, it would be nice to know, that do yo think, that we have to tolerate some inaccuracy even in "official"weights of animals which are weighed on field or how do you see situation? I have always thought, that + - 5 kg with animals weighing 200-300 kg is nothing special.
Like I said before, I think is futile to continue arguing about this weigtht, because is already accepted in the scientific books.
However, regarding the credibility of Dr Richard Kock, I think that there is no point on it as Mr Kock did not published anything directly. In fact, Nowell & Jackson (1996) quoted what was probably an unpublished paper that was certainly housed in Kenya, or maybe it was send to them by Kock, or something like that - it only says "R. Kock in litt. 1993". But none of the two sources shows that Kock published something regarding this figure, so his accuracy is not relevant here. Now, regarding the emails and its content, in this case is the reliability of the posters, not Dr Kock, what is in the table. Are "Tigerlover", "Boldchamp" or "Waveriders" reliable? That is open to question, and will depend of the reader. I think, and is my personal idea based in the emails and the reported cases of cattle-eaters, that this lion do had some stomach content, small or not depends of apreciation (5 kg may be small for a lion, specially of that size) and was probably fat (for wild animal standards), but this is open to debate and depends of the emails, not directly of Dr Kock. Again, the aceptance of the emails depends of the reader and the two documents and the pink card do not mention anything about stomach content or anything like that. If the lion had or not stomach content was very relevant in the old days of AVA forum, so relevant that even a little difference in the emails created huge discusions. What you think that is small, it wasn't in those days. I think is safe to quote the weight as it is in Nowell & Jackson (1996), with the details from Peterhans & Gnoske (2001) and maybe we can add those from the pink card in the picture. Anything out of that is pure speculation.
10-24-2018, 11:23 AM
( This post was last modified: 10-24-2018, 03:45 PM by Shadow
Edit Reason: typos
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(10-24-2018, 06:01 AM)GuateGojira Wrote: Like I said before, I think is futile to continue arguing about this weigtht, because is already accepted in the scientific books.I reply in a little bit different order. First that + - 5 kg. There I was talking about possible errors what can come in weighing "in field". Those weighings are made with different equipment and in difficult conditions and there can be many factors causing some inaccuracy. I keep pretty much every weight taken like that, approximate weights. And I don´t mind, it is hard work many times and a few kilos here or there isn´t so important, when we are talking about big animals. If we are too pedantic, next thing to argue is, that when one animal was shot, how much it bled before weighing, there we can argue easily about another 5-10 kilos depending if bullet cut artery and animal bled heavily before final breath :) Stomach content is again another case. What comes to stomach content, I just said, that Kock seemed to keep it insignificant in this case and I didn´t see any dramatic contradiction in his emails. For him that lion can be quite minor issue and when replying for courtesy while doing something more important for him, answer can be quick and short. People can give two answers, which are basically same answer with just a little bit different words, because they have no idea, to what kind of discussion their emails are then attached. What other issues there have been in discussions about this lion, luckily I haven´t seen those heated up "debates" :) I know, that in many forums discussions are more or less excuse for some people to compete in how much they can curse, call names and try to insult others, topic isn´t important, important is to show lack of any manners and immaturity. In those conditions there is a big temptation to forget objectivity for anyone. Anyway my point wasn´t to debate about this lion, for me it´s quite meaningless if it was 230 or 250 or 270 kg. Lions in captivity are much heavier, so we aren´t talking about some 8th wonder of the world, whatever that weight was, but about a big lion and all of those weights are in possible range for a lion to reach if it has enough prey to eat for some time period. More interesting topic for me would be, that in what weight a tiger or lion in wildlife starts to be too heavy to be able to hunt efficiently or is there such weight :) About this topic my points were just weighing in field, was there any real contradiction in emails (I think not) and then credibility of Kock (, which I think is in decent level). He is also alive so if someone have doubts and is interested, he is most probably possible to contact and make questions. I have to admit, that I am not that interested, but if someone is. And speculation.... yes, there is almost every time room for that, sometimes it is reasonable, sometimes funny and sometimes frustrating. Depending quite a lot about arguments used to back up that speculation.
@Shadow, I think that a few points must be clarified before to finish this conversation.
1. I am aware that the method of weighing and the machine itself are things that are normally ignored in these debates. Also if there is any variation caused by the machine itself, loss of blood or whatever other issue is normally ignored by the common poster. However, normally the scientific papers only quote the figures obtained and very rarely mention other details. If we follow the published documents of this particular weight, there are no details of this, so the figure of 272 kg is reliable but I will not especulate anything more about it. 2. About the emails, like I said before, it depends of the posters that showed them, not of Dr Kock. We must be honest, we don't know if the people actually talked with the expert or not. Now, there is also another thing that we must take in count, and is that maybe Dr Kock was also just answering what he tought that the person wanted to believe, and he was not trying to add any relevant information in the emails. But again, this is just especulation. 3. The old debates in AVA forum and those that still happen in Carnivora forum still show the type of behaviour that you described in your post. Hopefully here in Wildfact.com we don't follow (or at least we tried) that line and we only try to found the truth behind the myth. Like you say, luckily you haven't seen those debates, that although in some cases it produced good information, in others it was only a "party" of insults and nonesences. 4. At this point, the record of the 272 kg lion is legit and can be used and the reputation of Dr Kock is not in the table anymore. It is a good idea to contact him and clarify the issue, but I think that any result will be irrelevant in this moment. 5. I put this answer only because the poster @Smilodon-Rex asked a question, I am not interested in continue to debate about this particular weight, I see no point at this particular moment. (10-25-2018, 05:42 AM)GuateGojira Wrote: @Shadow, I think that a few points must be clarified before to finish this conversation.Well, 1. Yes, some things are good to ignore, because there would be endless swamps. To me that 272 kg is as reliable as any weighing on the field. Approximate weight of an animal. 2. Yes, we don´t know, but there were two email addresses and dr. Kock is working in public office. So if there is doubt about that kind of issue, it is quite easy to check situation. Especially if talking about something, which seems to be exceptional. I have to say, that I would find it odd, that a scientist would endanger his credibility by answering to some specific question what someone wants to hear, not as it is. I find it most probable, that some sloppiness in hurry. But of course, that is my estimation and I can be wrong. 3. Yes, I know that there still are these debates in many places, I just don´t open those sites after seeing what kind of people there are writing :) There are much more convenient ways to find information if some issue is interesting. 4. Dr. Kock seems to be quite reasonable guy as far as I have seen his interviews. If this lion weight would feel in some way impossible, then I would contact him, if for no other reason, just for personal curiosity. But because that weight is "only" telling a story about an exceptional lion, not impossible, I don´t care enough :) 5. No need to continue, that weight wasn´t my point either here. Still time to time it is good to discuss how some information is gathered and then considered. Too many people forget source criticism, logical deduction, importance to check multiple sources (if/when possible) and common sense with objectivity. Time to time it is good to have different kind of points of views to be discussed about some issues. In some things, like how long a certain bone (found from somewhere) is, there is not too much to discuss, but then again in many things all what we have are opinions and speculation, approximates and best estimations, not absolute truths. So it is interesting to see what kind of reasoning is behind some estimation or opinion :)  *This image is copyright of its original author European lion trying to ambush Aurochs  *This image is copyright of its original author attacking bull deer
What I can say here is that if predators like lions and tigers resort to eating large animals like buffaloes and domestic cattle, then one can expect them to weigh above average estimates, and a case to demonstrate for this is the 388.7 kg (857 lbs) north Indian tiger shot by David Hassinger in 1967 That figure was obtained after it ate a buffalo calf:
The Smithosonian (https://archive.is/20130202094033/http:/...nov95.html): "But one thing is certain: this 857-pound tiger was not hungry when Hasinger dispatched him. Earlier that day the Bengal had dragged off a buffalo calf and the 80-pound rock to which it was tethered, leaving footprints "as large as dinner plates." And I have found something similarly extraordinary for 2 Tanzanian lions that had killed a whopping 244 cattle, besides some donkeys, in January 1963: https://books.google.com/books?id=i_JPAQ...sc=y&hl=en 
About post #192: I realize this is a lion topic, but I have read numerous books about the historic grizzly of nineteenth century and early twentieth century N. America. Those "outlaw grizzlies" who preyed upon sheep, cattle, and other livestock were very large bears.
Lionzilla skull measurements with pictures using similar measurement methods of the previous liger skull with width slightly exceeded 12 inches. Maybe this is the biggest lion skull ever.
Wow, well done @johnny rex!!! Ok, let's take a look to these pictures. Did you take it, or it was another person?
To be honest is very hard to see the exactly size in the meter to the 1/16 of an inch, specially because of the curvatures and that some parts are not completelly flat, but IF I see correctly, the greatest length from incisors to the posterior end of the inion is about 16 1/4 in (413 mm) which means that excluding the incisors and taking the length from the anterior end of the premaxillary it will be about 407 mm; the byzigomatics arches are about 11 1/2 in (292 mm). This is in fact the widest skull from a lion that I know. To make a comparison, the largest and widest wild-origin skulls from scientific records are 401 X 247 mm and 393 x 256 mm respectively, both from Southern Africa (Roberts, 1951). From captive specimens, the longest and widest skull that I know is a specimen of 410 X 300 mm from Egypt, probably a captive "Barbary" lion (Saber & Gummow, 2014). From Rowland Ward edition of 1975 the longest and widest skulls are 420.7 X 273 mm and 384.2 X 288.9 mm (it doesn't say if are "owner's measurements" or measured by Rowland Ward's company staff). Finally the extra large lion from Boneclones.com is of 393 X 278 mm. With all these skulls for comparison, it seems that this "Lionzilla" skull match almoust perfectly with the giant lion skull from the Egypt museum. I will corroborate with the authors if the large skull is the same specimen from the National Circus in Egypt. I have a very large database of wild and captive skulls, and the only "real" specimen that match the measurements of the "Lionzilla" skull is the the Egyptian specimen. Is posible that these two skulls are, in fact, one and the same? |
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