Saber-toothed cat

shaped canine teeth. These animals belong to taxa

of Machairodontinae (Felidae), Barbourofelidae and
Nimravidae (both Feliformia), as well as two families related to marsupials that were found worldwide from the
Eocene epoch to the end of the Pleistocene epoch (42
mya 11,000 years ago), existing for about 42 million
years.[4][5][6] The large maxillary canine teeth extended
from the mouth even when it was closed. Despite the
name, not all animals known as saber-toothed cats were
closely related to modern felines.
The Nimravidae are the oldest, entering the landscape
around 42 mya and becoming extinct by 7.2 mya. Barbourofelidae entered around 16.9 mya and were extinct
by 9 mya. These two would have shared some habitats.

1 Morphology
An artists reconstruction of a Smilodon

These subfamilies evolved their saber-toothed characteristics entirely independently. They are most known for
having maxillary canines which were, in some species,
up to 50 cm (19.7 inches) long and extended down from
the mouth even when the mouth was closed. Sabretoothed cats were generally more robust than todays cats
and were quite bear-like in build. They were believed to
be excellent hunters and hunted animals such as sloths,
mammoths, and other large prey. Evidence from the
numbers found at La Brea Tar Pits suggests that Smilodon,
like modern lions, was a social carnivore.[7]
The rst late saber-tooth instance is a group of animals
ancestral to mammals but not yet mammals. Known as
synapsids or mammal-like reptiles, they were one of the
rst groups of animals to experience specialization of
teeth and many had long canines. Some had two pairs of
upper canines with two jutting down from each side, but
most had one pair of upper extreme canines. Because of
their primitiveness, they are extremely easy to tell from
machairodonts. With no cononoid process, many sharp
premolars more like pegs than scissors and a very long,
lizard-like head are among several characteristics that
mark them out.

A Smilodon skull on display at the American Museum of Natural

History

The second appearance of long canines is Thylacosmilus,

which is the most distinctive of the saber-tooth mammals
and is also easy to tell apart. It diers from machairodonts
in a possessing a very prominent ange and a tooth that
is triangular in cross section. The root of the canines is
more prominent than in machairodonts and a true sagittal
crest is absent.

A saber-toothed cat (alternatively spelled sabretoothed cat),[1] also misleadingly known as a sabertoothed tiger,[2][3] is any of various groups of predatory mammals related to modern cats (or resembling
cats) that were characterized by long, curved saber1

3 ECOLOGY

The third instance of saber teeth is from order Creodonta.

The small and slender Machaeroides bore canines that
were thinner than in the average machairodont. Its muzzle was longer and narrower.
The fourth saber-tooth appearance is the ancient family of carnivores, the nimravids, and they are notoriously
hard to tell apart from machairodonts. Both groups have
short skulls, tall sagittal crests, and their general skull
shape is very similar. Some have distinctive anges, and
some have none at all, so this confuses the matter further. Machairodonts were almost always bigger, though,
and their canines were longer and more stout for the most
part, but exceptions do appear.
The fth appearance is the barbourofelids. These carnivores are very closely related to actual cats, and as such,
they are hard to tell apart. The best known barbourofelid
is Barbourofelis, which diers from most machairodonts
by a much heavier and more stout mandible, smaller
orbits, massive and almost knobby anges, and canines
that are farther back. The average machairodont had
well-developed incisors, but barbourofelids were more
extreme.

herbivores of the era. The evolution of enlarged canines

in Tertiary carnivores was a result of large mammals being the source of prey for saber-toothed cats. The development of the saber-toothed condition appears to represent a shift in function and killing behavior, rather than
one in predator-prey relations. Many hypotheses exist
concerning saber-tooth killing methods, some of which
include attacking soft tissue such as the belly and throat,
where biting deep was essential to generate killing blows.
The elongated teeth also aided with strikes reaching major blood vessels in these large mammals. However, the
precise functional advantage of the saber-toothed cats
bite, particularly in relation to prey size, is a mystery. A
new point-to-point bite model is introduced in the article
by Andersson et al., showing that for saber-tooth cats, the
depth of the killing bite decreases dramatically with increasing prey size. The extended gape of saber-toothed
cats results in a considerable increase in bite depth when
biting into prey with a radius of less than 10 cm. For
the sabre-tooth, this size-reversed functional advantage
suggests predation on species within a similar size range
to those attacked by present-day carnivorans, rather than
mega herbivores as previously believed.

The sixth and last of the saber-tooth group to evolve were A disputing view of the cats hunting technique and abilthe machairodonts themselves.
ity is presented by C.K. Brain in The Hunters or the
Hunted? in which he attributes the cats prey-killing abil 1st saber-tooth instance:
Synapsida, the ities to its large neck muscles rather than its jaws. Large
gorgonopsid Gorgonops skull
cats use both the upper and lower jaw to bite down and
bring down the prey. The strong bite of the jaw is ac 2nd saber-tooth instance:
Thylacosmilidae credited to the strong temporalis muscle that attach from
(Sparassodonta) - Thylacosmilus atrox skull
the skull to the coronoid process of the jaw. The larger
3rd saber-tooth instance: Creodonta, family un- the coronoid process, the larger the muscle that attaches
there, so the stronger the bite. As C.K. Brain points
determined - Machaeroides skull
out, the saber-toothed cats had a greatly reduced coro 4th saber-tooth instance: Nimravidae (Carnivora) noid process and therefore a disadvantageously weak bite.
- Hoplophoneus primaevus skull and upper cervical The cat did, however, have an enlarged mastoid process,
vertebrae
a muscle attachment at the base of the skull, which attaches to neck muscles. According to C.K. Brain, the
5th saber-tooth instance:
Barbourofelidae
saber-tooth would use a downward thrust of the head,
(Carnivora) - Barbourofelis skeleton
powered by the neck muscles to drive the large upper
6th saber-tooth instance: Felidae (Carnivora) - canines into the prey. This technique was more ecient
than those of true cats.
Smilodon skull and upper cervical vertebrae

Prey

3 Ecology

The similarity in all these unrelated families involves convergent evolution of the saber-like canines as a hunting
adaptation. Meehan et al. note that it took around 8
million years for a new type of saber-toothed cat to ll
the niche of an extinct predecessor in a similar ecological
role; this has happened at least four times with dierent
families of animals developing this adaptation. Although
the adaptation of the saber-like canines made these creaSteps of reconstruction
tures successful, it seems that the shift to obligate carMany of the saber-toothed cats food sources were large nivorism, along with co-evolution with large prey animals,
mammals such as elephants, rhinos, and other colossal led the saber-toothed cats of each time period to extinc-

3
tion. As per Van Valkenburgh, the adaptations that made
saber-toothed cats successful also made the creatures vulnerable to extinction. In her example, trends toward an
increase in size, along with greater specialization, acted
as a macro-evolutionary ratchet": when large prey became scarce or extinct, these creatures would be unable
to adapt to smaller prey or consume other sources of food,
and would be unable to reduce their size so as to need less
food.[8]

Saber-tooth genera

Saber-tooth evolutionary tree

References

[1] See for example sabre-toothed cat Encyclopdia Britannica. 2009. Encyclopdia Britannica Online. 26 Oct.
2009.
[2] Pool, Bob (September 16, 2012). What Is A Sabertooth. UC Berkeley. Retrieved 2012-06-12. I remember reading about this as a kid. I can still remember seeing
a picture of the saber-toothed tiger struggling in the tar
[3] What Is a Sabertooth?". University of California Museum of Paleontology. December 2005. Retrieved 201206-12. The name saber-toothed tiger is misleading as
these animals are not closely related to tigers.
[4] PaleoBiology Database: ''Smilodon'', basic info. Paleodb.org. Retrieved 2012-09-06.
[5] PaleoBiology Database: ''Nimravidae'', basic info. Paleodb.org. Retrieved 2012-09-06.
[6] PaleoBiology Database: ''Barbourofelidae'', basic info.
Paleodb.org. Retrieved 2012-09-06.

Brain, C. K. Part 2: Fossil Assemblages from the

Sterkfontein Valley Caves: Analysis and Interpretation. The Hunters or the Hunted?: An Introduction
to African Cave Taphonomy. Chicago: University
of Chicago, 1981. N. pag. Print.
Meehan, T.J., Martin, L.D. Extinction and ReEvolution of Similar Adaptive Types (Ecomorphs)
in Cenozoic North American Ungulates and Carnivores Reect van der Hammens Cycles. Naturwissenschaften (2003) 90:131135. 07 Feb. 2003.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00114-002-0392-1
Mol, D., W. v. Logchem, K. v. Hooijdonk, R.
Bakker. The Saber-Toothed Cat. DrukWare, Norg
2008. ISBN 978-90-78707-04-2.
Sardella, R. Web of Knowledge [v5.6]". SOC
PALEONTOLOGICA ITALIANA, C/O E.
SERPAGLI, EDITOR, IST DI PALEONTOLOGIA VIA UNIV 4, MODENA, 00000,
ITALY, 10 Mar. 2012. Web. 18 Oct. 2012.
<http://apps.webofknowledge.com/full_record.
do?product=WOS>.
Van Valkenburgh, B. Dj vu: The Evolution of
Feeding Morphologies in the Carnivora. Integrative and Comparative Biology. (2007) 47 1:147
163. 22 May 2007. http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/
icm016

8 Further reading
Anton, Mauricio (2013). Sabertooth. Bloomington:
Indiana University Press. ISBN 0253010497.

9 External links

[7] Carbone, C.; Maddox, T.; Funston, P. J.; Mills, M. G.;

Grether, G. F.; Van Valkenburgh, B. (2009). Parallels
between playbacks and Pleistocene tar seeps suggest sociality in an extinct sabretooth cat, Smilodon. Biol Lett. 5
(1): 8185. doi:10.1098/rsbl.2008.0526. PMC 2657756.
PMID 18957359.

Extinct Cats Index

[8] Van Valkenburgh, B. (2007). Deja vu: the evolution of feeding morphologies in the Carnivora. Integrative and Comparative Biology 47 (1): 147163.
doi:10.1093/icb/icm016.

Prehistoric cats and prehistoric cat-like creatures

Sources
Andersson, K., Norman, D. and Werdelin, L.
Sabretoothed Carnivores and the Killing of Large
Prey. PloS ONE 6.10 (2011): 16. Academic
Search Premier. Web. 11 Oct. 2012. http://dx.
doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0024971

Illinois State Museum: Saber-toothed Cats

UC Berkeley Museum of Paleontology: Sabretoothed Cats

10

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10.1

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