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11-17-2018, 10:32 PM( This post was last modified: 11-17-2018, 10:35 PM by GuateGojira )
The case of the Sri Lanka "lion" and the Sri Lanka "tiger" is very problematic. The description of Deraniyagala is incredible poor, based in only few canines and at this moment, no other analysis has been done in those fossils. Is important to remember that he also described a "tiger subspecies" in Sudan as Panthera tigris sudanensis (sic!) based in a single skin that was obviously imported from the Caspian region and was critizised by his lazy investigation regarding the specimen (Mazák, 1983-2013).
Regarding the "tiger" fossils, the anaylisis made with the few metapodials used only a single leopard specimen for comparison, and been this the only native great cat of the island, it should take more specimens for a wider analysis. It seems like if the authors tried to "prove" that tigers lived in the area. However, it is interesting that the first fossils from true tigers in India are from less than 12,000 years ago, which suggest a much latter arrival of the tiger in the Indian subcontinent, which make sense as the Indian region was dry and not a good tiger habitat but perfect for lions, which arrived India earlier.
There is a posibility for the existence of lions in Sri Lanka (together with leopards), but I highly doubt that tigers did lived in the subcontinent before the Holocene. DNA analysis should be made to settle the issue, after all, morphological analysis per se had demostrate that is some cases are not good enough like the case of the cave "lions" from Eurasia and America.
Sri-Lanka(n)/Ceylon Lion, Ceylon (Bengal) Tiger & Ceylon (Asiatic) Cheetah
