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Freak Felids - A Discussion of History's Largest Felines

Venezuela epaiva Offline
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(07-22-2021, 04:14 PM)Pckts Wrote:
(07-22-2021, 06:06 AM)epaiva Wrote:
(07-22-2021, 05:31 AM)tigerluver Wrote:
(06-07-2021, 02:42 AM)LoveAnimals Wrote: @tigerluver

I've read a study that estimated the body mass of two speciments of Ngandong Tuger and Smilodon Populator, the result was 486 kg and 517 kg for the largest speciments of the species.

Even though it's only an estimate, are these two cats truly esrimated to be that heavy on max size? That puts them on the same level of today's bears (also average polar bear) except for max sizes since kodiaks and polars can exceed 700 kg


My apologies for missing this. That paper used a lot of bone width so could be a bit overestimated but 400+ kg is fair. Yes, this is possible as their frames were very large. There are two ways to grow in weight, increase girth of the torso or length of the torso. The length of torso is what cats increased and it adds on weight very fast, perhaps even quicker than girth increases.

(07-22-2021, 04:33 AM)Acinonyx sp. Wrote: @tigerluver 

Are there any body length estimates for the smilodon species?


I do not believe so. They were quite a bit shorter in anteroposterior length for their shoulder height compared to extant cats, S. fatalis especially so. @epaiva I believe has a communication where the museum tells him the body length of the S. fatalis in their collection and hopefully he can kindly share.

Acinonyx sp.
Smilodon fatalis has a head and body length of 1,70 mts and a height at the shoulders of 1 mt
I wonder what the additional skin, flesh and muscle add to the measurements?
I would like to know that information too, i think  @“tigerluver” can give us that valuable information
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United States Pckts Offline
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(07-22-2021, 06:02 PM)epaiva Wrote:
(07-22-2021, 04:14 PM)Pckts Wrote:
(07-22-2021, 06:06 AM)epaiva Wrote:
(07-22-2021, 05:31 AM)tigerluver Wrote:
(06-07-2021, 02:42 AM)LoveAnimals Wrote: @tigerluver

I've read a study that estimated the body mass of two speciments of Ngandong Tuger and Smilodon Populator, the result was 486 kg and 517 kg for the largest speciments of the species.

Even though it's only an estimate, are these two cats truly esrimated to be that heavy on max size? That puts them on the same level of today's bears (also average polar bear) except for max sizes since kodiaks and polars can exceed 700 kg


My apologies for missing this. That paper used a lot of bone width so could be a bit overestimated but 400+ kg is fair. Yes, this is possible as their frames were very large. There are two ways to grow in weight, increase girth of the torso or length of the torso. The length of torso is what cats increased and it adds on weight very fast, perhaps even quicker than girth increases.

(07-22-2021, 04:33 AM)Acinonyx sp. Wrote: @tigerluver 

Are there any body length estimates for the smilodon species?


I do not believe so. They were quite a bit shorter in anteroposterior length for their shoulder height compared to extant cats, S. fatalis especially so. @epaiva I believe has a communication where the museum tells him the body length of the S. fatalis in their collection and hopefully he can kindly share.

Acinonyx sp.
Smilodon fatalis has a head and body length of 1,70 mts and a height at the shoulders of 1 mt
I wonder what the additional skin, flesh and muscle add to the measurements?
I would like to know that information too, i think  @“tigerluver” can give us that valuable information
My guess would be that with the addition of skin and flesh we’d have a standard sized Lion/Tiger body measurement. Probably a little taller at the shoulder than while a little shorter in the body.
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United States tigerluver Offline
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(07-22-2021, 04:14 PM)Pckts Wrote:
(07-22-2021, 06:06 AM)epaiva Wrote:
(07-22-2021, 05:31 AM)tigerluver Wrote:
(06-07-2021, 02:42 AM)LoveAnimals Wrote: @tigerluver

I've read a study that estimated the body mass of two speciments of Ngandong Tuger and Smilodon Populator, the result was 486 kg and 517 kg for the largest speciments of the species.

Even though it's only an estimate, are these two cats truly esrimated to be that heavy on max size? That puts them on the same level of today's bears (also average polar bear) except for max sizes since kodiaks and polars can exceed 700 kg


My apologies for missing this. That paper used a lot of bone width so could be a bit overestimated but 400+ kg is fair. Yes, this is possible as their frames were very large. There are two ways to grow in weight, increase girth of the torso or length of the torso. The length of torso is what cats increased and it adds on weight very fast, perhaps even quicker than girth increases.

(07-22-2021, 04:33 AM)Acinonyx sp. Wrote: @tigerluver 

Are there any body length estimates for the smilodon species?


I do not believe so. They were quite a bit shorter in anteroposterior length for their shoulder height compared to extant cats, S. fatalis especially so. @epaiva I believe has a communication where the museum tells him the body length of the S. fatalis in their collection and hopefully he can kindly share.

Acinonyx sp.
Smilodon fatalis has a head and body length of 1,70 mts and a height at the shoulders of 1 mt
I wonder what the additional skin, flesh and muscle add to the measurements?


S. fatalis was really short in the body. The the scapula bone very superficial so not much height needs to be added. For the length, not much has to be added either as the pelvis is superficial, so just a little for the anterior head. Based on my reconstruction of the largest humerus I got a height of about 1.05 meters and a length of about 1.6 m in the flesh.
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Venezuela epaiva Offline
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Skeleton (top) and reconstructed life appearance of Smilodon fatalis. Shoulder height 100 cm.
Taken from the book Sabertooth - Mauricio Anton 

*This image is copyright of its original author
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Italy AndresVida Offline
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(07-22-2021, 05:31 AM)tigerluver Wrote: My apologies for missing this.
Don't worry it's alright, thanks for answering!

I never understood actually the real shoulder height of smilodon populator actually, some say 120 cm, others even 140 cm and Roman the one who designs models for prehistoric fauna claims a shoulder height of 130 cm. If the frame of Smilodon is so big to allow it exceeding 400 kg and perhaps approaching or reaching 500 kg, shouldn't it be at least 120 cm?
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Venezuela epaiva Offline
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Smilodon populator was a lot larger than Smilodon fatalis, yes it measured 120 cm at the shoulders and was very powerful 
Pictures taken from the book Sabertooth (Mauricio Anton)

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author
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Venezuela epaiva Offline
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Credit to @paleontology_id

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author
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Maldives AtroxKing Offline
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(06-23-2014, 11:02 PM)GrizzlyClaws Wrote: How about the Duisburg specimen? Could he be a modern genetic twin of the Wanhsien tiger?

It is interesting to see so many modern incarnations of the prehistoric tigers.
What weight would you give for Natodomeri lion, having a 460mm skull?
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United States GrizzlyClaws Offline
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(08-17-2021, 07:53 PM)AtroxKing Wrote:
(06-23-2014, 11:02 PM)GrizzlyClaws Wrote: How about the Duisburg specimen? Could he be a modern genetic twin of the Wanhsien tiger?

It is interesting to see so many modern incarnations of the prehistoric tigers.
What weight would you give for Natodomeri lion, having a 460mm skull?

From my own impression, they should have weighed about 350 - 400 kg for those really large males, maybe with very few exceptional freak specimens that could push above 400 kg.
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Italy AndresVida Offline
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@tigerluver

What is the max shoulder height for Ngandong tiger? Up to 125 cm?
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United Kingdom T-RexWins Offline
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@GuateGojira
 
The Wikipedia page of Panthera atrox has been edited now and it is way better than what it was before.

I mentioned that Anyonge's 523KG upper estimate is an exaggeration according to later researchers, Christensen and Harris, citing the sources. 

A fan cannot take control of the Wikipedia page as there are several users with the required permissions who can edit it. Only an administrator can do such a thing, but they don't unless the page is heavily protected from vandalism (for example, Donald Trump's Wiki page).
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Guatemala GuateGojira Offline
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(01-04-2022, 09:02 PM)T-RexWins Wrote: @GuateGojira
 
The Wikipedia page of Panthera atrox has been edited now and it is way better than what it was before.

I mentioned that Anyonge's 523KG upper estimate is an exaggeration according to later researchers, Christensen and Harris, citing the sources. 

A fan cannot take control of the Wikipedia page as there are several users with the required permissions who can edit it. Only an administrator can do such a thing, but they don't unless the page is heavily protected from vandalism (for example, Donald Trump's Wiki page).

I see the changes and the weight issue has been corrected, that is ok.

Now, about the "fan" situation I disagree. I know several articles that are constantly changed by biased people, indenpendently of the persmissions. In fact, while the English section is protected at some point, the Spanish section is a dissaster, ALL the great cats articles are full of crap and I located the persons that are vandilizing it, one of them is an "administrator".
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Guatemala GuateGojira Offline
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( This post was last modified: 01-14-2022, 03:21 AM by GuateGojira )

(09-30-2021, 01:03 AM)LoveAnimals Wrote: @tigerluver

What is the max shoulder height for Ngandong tiger? Up to 125 cm?

Good question, let me tell you that the estimation of up to 120 cm was made by me, based in the fact that I estimated a head-body length of c.230 cm (straight line) for the largest specimen (femur of 480 mm, and using pictures of other tiger skeletons) and the fact that shoulder height of tigers is about 50% of the head-body. New calculations of Tigerluver put the head-body at about 240 cm (straight line) as far I remember, so the shoulder height is still estimated at 120 cm.

Now, please remember that we don't have a complete specimen of the Ngandong tiger, we have at least 7 bones from diferent specimens, from them only 4 are from limbs and one skull, one humerus and the skull are of the same size as the largest modern tigers recorded, while the other humerus and the femur surpass the size of any modern tiger.

The other fossils are dentitions and an incomplete mandible, this last one was estimated at c.270 mm, which is big, but other estimations made by the dentition set it at about c.260 mm (same size as the biggest modern tigers). However an analisys of the relation of the dentition and the skull length made by @tigerluver showed that the relation is very weak, so until someone actually measure the mandible and made a final estimation, we can only guess its size. I don't remember if Dr Koenigswald did measured the mandible, Tigerluver has the book, maybe he can give us more light on this. 

Now, it is interesting to remember that a fossil of a partial mandible from Borneo is actually the biggest tiger recorded at this moment, sadly is still unnamed so for the moment is just classified as Panthera tigris sp. from the Pleistocene of Borneo.
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Guatemala GuateGojira Offline
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(08-17-2021, 07:53 PM)AtroxKing Wrote: What weight would you give for Natodomeri lion, having a 460mm skull?

Probably about the same weight of the largest Panthera atrox specimens, which is up to 351 kg. With a basilar length of 380 mm (GSL is unknown and was not estimated by the authors in the paper), it is just surpassed by two Panthera atrox skulls (2900-3 with 388 mm & Univ.calif-14001 with 404.7 mm) and a few other Cave lion specimens from Eurasia.
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Guatemala GuateGojira Offline
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(07-26-2021, 12:32 PM)LoveAnimals Wrote: I never understood actually the real shoulder height of smilodon populator actually, some say 120 cm, others even 140 cm and Roman the one who designs models for prehistoric fauna claims a shoulder height of 130 cm. If the frame of Smilodon is so big to allow it exceeding 400 kg and perhaps approaching or reaching 500 kg, shouldn't it be at least 120 cm?

Smilodon was more like a bear or wolverine in its body robusticity, short and very heavy. In this case, Smilodon fatalis was smaller than an average Bengal tiger or South African lion (head-body length up to 175 cm against 190 cm in lion and tiger) but weighed more than the biggest lions and tigers recorded by scientist (weight up to 280 kg against 250-260 kg in lion and tiger). 


*This image is copyright of its original author


S. populator was about the same case, probably not more than 120 cm tall but weighed about 400 kg, more than the longer-taller cave lions and Pleistocene tigers.


As far I know, the official figure for the shoulder height of S. populator is up to 120 cm, quoted by Mauricio Anton.
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