The Big Cats And Their Fossil Relatives: An Illustrated Guide to Their Evolution and Natural History

Description

Author: Turner, Alan

Publisher: Columbia University Press

Pub Date: 1997 (Second printing)

Binding: Hardcover

Condition: Book: Fair.  Binding tight.  No tears, bends or folds.  Highlighting throughout, some markings in red pen.  Light edge and corner wear.  Dust Jacket: Fair.  NOT price clipped (no price indicated).  Upper front cover corner creased, bumped.  Wear to head ad foot of spine.  Creasing to upper rear cover edge near spine head.

Notes: Illustrations by Mauricio Anton.  “Only seven extant large-bodied cats survive from the important and remarkably diverse radiations of felid carnivores since mid-Tertiary times, some 25 million years (Ma) ago….the extant species of the genera Panthera (lion, leopard, tiger, jaguar, and snow leopard), Felis (puma or cougar), and Acinonyx (cheetah), afford invaluable insights into the adaptations, diversifications, and behaviors of one tribe (Felini) …Extinctions in the course of the late Tertiary and at several times during the Pleistocene led to the loss of the last of the paleofelids (Barbourofelis) and of three other major groups (tribes) of felids–metailurines, homotherines, and smilodontines…minimally, about four-fifths of the large bodied felids known over the past 10-12 Ma have vanished…” (From the Foreword).  Black-and-white drawings, eight page color section.