Cape lion

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Cape lion
Image of a cape lion from the Paris zoo around 1860

Image of a cape lion from the Paris zoo around 1860

Systematics
Subordination : Feline (Feliformia)
Family : Cats (Felidae)
Subfamily : Big cats (pantherinae)
Genre : Real big cats ( Panthera )
Type : Lion ( panthera leo )
Subspecies : Cape lion
Scientific name
Panthera leo melanochaita
( Ch. H. Smith , 1842)

The Cape lion ( Panthera leo melanochaita ; from ancient Greek : μέλαινᾰ (f.) (Melaina) - black, dark and ἡ χαίτη (hē chaítē) - the mane) is an extinct variety or subspecies of the African lion .

description

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The Cape Lions lived on the southern tip of the African continent. They were not the only subspecies in South Africa , the exact range is unknown. Its main distribution area was the Cape Province in the area around Cape Town . The last Cape Lion in the province was killed in 1858.

As with the Berber lion , various individuals and institutions claim to have surviving lions. In 2000, possible specimens were found in captivity in Russia and brought to South Africa for breeding. A reliable differentiation between possible Cape Lions and other long-maned lions in captivity is not possible. Lions in captivity are now bred from specimens that were caught long ago in Africa. Later the different subspecies were mixed.

Earlier authors assigned the Cape lion the status of a subspecies due to its supposedly characteristic morphological features. Characteristic are the huge mane of the male, which extends behind the shoulders and covers the stomach, as well as the conspicuous black ear tips. The Cape lion is said to have been about 2.76 meters tall, and the average weight of an animal was up to 200 kg.

However, it is now known that various external factors, including the ambient temperature, influence the color and size of a lion's mane. Results of the investigation of the DNA , published in 2006, do not support subspecies status. It now appears that the Cape lion was just the southernmost population of the Transvaal lion ( Panthera leo krugeri ).

literature

  • Peyton M. West, Craig Packer: Sexual selection, temperature, and the lion's mane. In: Science . Volume 297, No. 5585. Washington DC Aug. 23, 2002, pp. 1339-1343, ISSN  0036-8075 , doi: 10.1126 / science.1073257 .
  • Ross Barnett, Nobuyuki Yamaguchi, Ian Barnes, Alan Cooper: Lost populations and preserving genetic diversity in the lion Panthera leo, Implications for its ex situ conservation. In: Conservation Genetics. Volume 7, No. 4. Kluwer, Dordrecht March 1, 2006. ISSN  1566-0621 , doi: 10.1007 / s10592-005-9062-0 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Cape lions height and weight. raubkatzen.info, accessed April 1, 2014 .

Web links

Commons : Cape lion ( Panthera leo melanochaita )  - Collection of images, videos and audio files