Abstract

RUIZ-RAMONI, Damián  and  MONTELLANO-BALLESTEROS, Marisol. Taxonomy and biogeography of the extinct giant wolf, Canis dirus Leidy 1858, in Mexico. Bol. Soc. Geol. Mex [online]. 2019, vol.71, n.1, pp.121-137. ISSN 1405-3322.  https://doi.org/10.18268/bsgm2019v71n1a7.

In the 80’s it was proposed that the extinct dire wolf, Canis dirus Leidy, 1858, was conformed by two subspecies: C. dirus dirus Leidy, 1858, which extended from the northeast of the United States to Canada and C. dirus guildayi Kurtén, 1984, which lived in México and the western coast of United States. In Mexico, this classification was based mainly on specimens from the San Josecito Cave, Nuevo León. With the aim of evaluating the proposed taxonomic assignment of the mexican record we performed a morphometric analysis comparing the mexican material with specimens of both subspecies from United States. México is the second region with the most abundant fossil record of this canid and, although most of the material is not well preserved, our results indicate that there are no differences between both subspecies, as a consequence the collected material from México must be identified only as Canis dirus.

Keywords : Canis dirus dirus; Canis dirus guildayi; Pleistocene; North America.

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