Paleobiogeographic implications of additional Felidae (Carnivora, Mammalia) specimens from the Siwaliks

ABSTRACT

Felids from G.E. Lewis’ Yale Peabody Museum collection of Siwalik fossil mammals are described, and palaeobiogeography is interpreted based on these specimens. Five felid taxa are recognised from these Miocene-Pliocene Siwalik Group collections, including three from the Chinji Zone: Sivaelurus chinjiensis, Sivaelurus sp., Pseudaelurus sp.; one from the Nagri Zone: Leptofelis cf. vallesiensis; and one from the Tatrot Zone: Metailurus cf. hengduanshanensis. Sivaelurus chinjiensis is similar to Miopanthera lorteti in morphology, and Miopanthera thus is viewed as a junior synonym of Sivaelurus. Leptofelis cf. vallesiensis from the Nagri Zone represents the first record of this genus in southern Asia, and Metailurus cf. hengduanshanensis represents one of the latest occurrences of the genus, suggesting that Metailurus survived into the late Pliocene widely in Asia. Carnivoran faunas suggest that during the Middle Miocene southern Asia shared more taxa with Europe than with eastern Asia, and a newly recognised Euroriental paleorealm is proposed based on this biogeographic pattern. Since the late Late Miocene, the similarity of southern and eastern Asian carnivoran faunas increased. This pattern coincides with that of proboscideans, and was probably controlled by geographic and environmental changes caused by the rise of the Tibetan Plateau.

KEYWORDS:

• Siwaliks
• Sivaelurus
• Pseudaelurus
• Leptofelis
• Metailurus
• palaeobiogeography

Acknowledgments

We are grateful to D. L. Brinkman (YPM), and J. Meng, R. O’Leary and J. Galkin (AMNH) for the access to the fossil material under their care. We are grateful to J. Barry for providing the paleomagnetic dating of fossil studied in this work, to A. Valenciano for discussion on the faunal composition from La Grive, to Y. Kimura for discussion on small mammals from southern Asia, to M.J. Salesa for providing photos of Leptofelis vallesiensis and to Y. Li for providing photos of Metailurus ultimus.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by the Strategic Priority Research Program of Chinese Academy of Sciences (Grant No. XDA20070203 and XDB26000000), Key Frontier Science Research Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (Grant Nos. QYZDY-SSW-DQC-22 and GJHZ1885), National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 41430102, 41872001 and 41772018) and China Scholarship Council, and the Frick Fund, Division of Vertebrate Paleontology, AMNH.