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Freak Felids - A Discussion of History's Largest Felines

Canada Balam Offline
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(05-16-2021, 12:57 AM)LoveAnimals Wrote:
(05-09-2021, 09:43 PM)Balam Wrote: Cougars and leopards aren't taller than jaguars, the height of jaguars quoted comes from a straight line and without counting the paw, whereas for leopards and cougars it usually counts the paw, cougars seem to have particularly long limbs so I wouldn't be surprised if the tallest males reach the 80 cm mark, but I'm highly skeptical of leopards reaching this threshold.
Wasn't the tallest cougar around 90 cm? That's basically as tall as a cheetah but the cougar is more proportioned about weight relative to its size. The tallest jaguar as you told me was 81 cm at the shoulder whereas on modern weights and measurements for wild leopards I have seen many leopards reaching the 80 cm mark with 2 of them topping at 86 cm. Maybe straight line?


(05-09-2021, 09:43 PM)Balam Wrote: The maximum recorded reliable weights for cougars and leopards are 103 kg and 96 kg respectively
Wasn't the largest cougar 105 and not 103 kg? By the way every weight ranges for animals are based on modern captures, I always like to consider the animal since it evolved till today. I mean leopards exist since pléistocène, several thousand of years ago. We caught the 96 kg Namibian one when their numbers were already decreasing because of hunting and less prey were disponible.
In a thousand years of history, with all the leopards that have walked on this planet, none of them gained those 4 kgs to reach 100 kg? To me it's 100%sure that's why I put 100 kgs as the generic limit of the leopards. We don't know about cougars but in my opinion 113 kg might me their limit. They are still larger than Leopards

However this is my take, on scientific records the largest leopards and cougars are 96 and 105 kg, but in a thousand years of existence larger males have existed FOR SURE.

You have a lot of preconceived notions and make a lot of claims but show no hard data to back your statements, no offense but this is the kind of superficial, immature, and deceitful talking points we see from the posters/trolls of Carnivora you previously mentioned which is tried to be avoided here.


Quote:Wasn't the tallest cougar around 90 cm? That's basically as tall as a cheetah but the cougar is more proportioned about weight relative to its size. The tallest jaguar as you told me was 81 cm at the shoulder whereas on modern weights and measurements for wild leopards I have seen many leopards reaching the 80 cm mark with 2 of them topping at 86 cm. Maybe straight line?

Data on the measurements of cougar heights are not too extensive but nonetheless, we have some data from one of the largest populations in the Rocky Mountains to go by Management Plan for Cougars in Alberta published in 1992:


*This image is copyright of its original author


Males from this vast area averaged 72 kg in weight and had an average shoulder height of 75 cm (measuring protocol not disclosed), a 90 cm shoulder height would be 20% higher than the average which seems highly unlikely unless the specimen in question is a freakish outlier. For leopards, the best data compilation for a very large population belonging to a protected area comes from Applicability of age-based hunting regulations for African leopards. by Balme et al.:


*This image is copyright of its original author

Males from this protected area averaged 68 kg and if we combine the shoulder heights averages of the mature males from 4 to 7+ years we get a combined average of 69.98 cm. The mature males that averaged the same as the adult RM cougars (72 kg) had a shoulder height of 71.43 cm, and the measuring protocol is not specified here either. The tallest male from this sample measured 75 cm at the shoulder, matching the averages for the RM cougars, as well as the body mass in kg of the heaviest leopard from this study.

Considering both species had a similar body mass in these studies, my previous claim that cougars grew taller is supported by these findings. In both cases, we do not know if the measurements included the length of the paw or the way in which the measuring tape was placed alongside their bodies. This is why you cannot take a value and compare it to another whose measuring standards are specified because you don't know if certain factors pertaining to measurements are inflating the values for one of the species. I can tell you right now that the shoulder heights claimed for leopard of Okonjima of 90+ cm are completely flawed and inflated, for example. Any claim of a leopard measuring 86 cm at the shoulder requires extraordinary evidence in suggesting they were taken on a straight, otherwise, it is prudent to infer that the measurements are not reliable.

Quote:Wasn't the largest cougar 105 and not 103 kg? By the way every weight ranges for animals are based on modern captures,

The heaviest reliable cougar was hunted in Colorado by President Roosevelt and weighed 227 lbs, its skull is to this day one of the largest in the world for cougars which give more reliability to the outlier body mass. You already know where the 96 kg leopard comes from.

Quote:I always like to consider the animal since it evolved till today. I mean leopards exist since pléistocène, several thousand of years ago. We caught the 96 kg Namibian one when their numbers were already decreasing because of hunting and less prey were disponible.

Evolution doesn't work that way, the genes of a cougar or leopard today are the exact same ones as those from last century, changes in body masses are dependant on the prey biomass and genetic diversity, but all of this falls within certain size barriers or ceilings which keep species from growing past certain thresholds, and in order for these genetic markers to change there needs to be a process of natural selection that takes hundreds of thousands of years. Leopards from many well-protected areas of Africa or Iran that have access to cattle-like prey in terms of BM (antelopes) and wide availability - like the KwaZulu-Natal leopards from the weight chart I posted above - showcase weights that are well within the ranges shown for leopards for centuries according to the hundreds of captures we have available. The average of 68 kg is in fact very high considering leopards in many areas of the world usually average between 50-60 kg. Furthermore, your asserstion that leopards from the Pleistocene were greater in size is completely unfounded, from the paper: Late Pleistocene leopards across Europe - northernmost European German population, highest elevated records in the Swiss Alps, complete skeletons in the Bosnia Herzegowina Dinarids and comparison to the Ice Age cave art by Diedrich.:


*This image is copyright of its original author

As stated above the skeletal remains of the European cave leopard P. pardus spelaea show dimensions that are in accordance to those of extant leopards that inhabit similar environments with similar prey, more notably the Persian leopard and likely the extinct Barbary leopard. Because leopards have always fulfilled the niche of secondary carnivores in the environments they have inhabited for hundreds of thousands of years (even subordinates to early jaguars in Europe), they have developed morphological adaptations to become proficient as agile and arboreal felids with gracile bodies who tackle medium-sized prey and avoid open spaces. Leopards would not be able to be leopards if they had to pack a large amount of body mass because it is counterproductive to their survival as subordinate carnivores to larger cats who have taken that specific evolutionary route. So as I mentioned before, leopards (and cougars, their NW counterparts in terms of ecological analog) possess certain genetic markers that keep them from growing past a certain threshold, and in the case of leopards, it seems to be around 95 kg.

Quote:However this is my take, on scientific records the largest leopards and cougars are 96 and 105 kg, but in a thousand years of existence larger males have existed FOR SURE.


100+ kg leopards may or may have not occurred throughout their evolutionary history, that is all nice speculation but it doesn't change or alters my point. The data that we have on them is clear for both extant and extinct forms, and 100+ kg in weight has yet to be achieved by a leopard and measured under reliable standards.
My advice is to stop with this obsession of leopards being "the size of lionesses" which many leopard fanboys seem to obsess over in the other forum you mentioned, learn to appreciate leopards for what they are and the areas in which they excel as big cats. Trying to extrapolate characteristics of other cats into the one you claim to prefer shows that you don't really value that cat for what it is.
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Messages In This Thread
RE: Freak Felids - A Discussion of History's Largest Felines - Balam - 05-16-2021, 03:31 AM
Sabertoothed Cats - brotherbear - 06-11-2016, 11:59 AM
RE: Sabertoothed Cats - peter - 06-11-2016, 04:28 PM
Ancient Jaguar - brotherbear - 01-04-2018, 12:45 AM



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