Canis lupus hominis

Posted in Identify the species | 9 Comments

9 Responses

1. on September 30, 2009 at 4:34 pm CJung

   I’m not great at ID-ing skulls. Is this a modern animal? The first thought off the top of my head was saber toothed tiger but I don’t recall their lower canines jutting out like that. I also don’t think the upper canines are big enough. The length of muzzle, shape of head and the look of the molars all say big cat. A leopard?

   
   
2. on September 30, 2009 at 5:45 pm Jess

   Snow Leopard?

   
   
3. on September 30, 2009 at 8:22 pm Bridget K.

   A woman walrus?

   
   
4. on September 30, 2009 at 8:44 pm Bridget K.

   What do think about this, a yellow lab pup, by a Victorian artist R. Ward (he’s not a painter, this is warning for sensitive dogfans).
   I wonder is it from the 1900th, or later production.

   

   
   
5. on September 30, 2009 at 10:05 pm Andrew D. Gable

   Is this specifically a local species? If it is, a cougar?

   If not — maybe a panther or tiger?

   
   
   • on September 30, 2009 at 10:11 pm retrieverman

     It’s not native to North America, and it’s not extinct.

     
     
6. on October 1, 2009 at 1:19 am Rinalia

   Here’s my roundabout way of figuring this out:

   First I thought it might be a marine mammal skull, like an elephant seal (b/c I had just seen one and they do have crazy teeth but not nearly so crazy as this animal’s). When it appeared the structure was quite different, I thought cat of some sort.

   And when I did an image search for cougar, it looked strikingly similar, though the canines were smaller and its forehead shorter. On a whim, I searched for what a leopard skull might look like (admittedly after I looked at a lion skull) and ended up at a website that sells replica skulls.

   The angels sang great songs about my google-fu skills when I came upon the clouded leopard’s replicated skull, which I could own for a mere $145.

   This got me thinking about a show I saw as a kid about a smallish leopard who would take on ginormous ungulates in epic battles on the sides of mountains. Of course, this turned out to be the snow leopard and not the clouded leopard but it was a fond (though gruesome) childhood memory.

   So I’m not sure if that qualifies as getting it correct. It would not have happened without the power of the goo. (I would have guessed marine mammal or big cat – vague, right?)

   
   
   • on October 1, 2009 at 1:20 am retrieverman

     And you just figure out where I got that photo!

     You’re 100 percent correct– it’s a clouded leopard.

     
     
   • on October 1, 2009 at 1:33 am Bridget K.

     I tried without the great goo nd ended up a dumb.

     
     

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