Environment
In some areas of its range, the American lion lived under cold climatic conditions. They probably used caves or fissures for shelter from the cold weather. They may have lined their dens with grass or leaves, as the Siberian tiger does, another great cat that currently lives in the north.
There are fewer American lions in the La Brea tar pits than other predators such as saber-toothed cats (Smilodon fatalis) or dire wolves (Canis dirus), which suggests they may have been smart enough to avoid the hazard. American lions likely preyed on deer, North American horses (now extinct), North American camels, North American tapirs, American bison, mammoths, and other large, herbivorous animals. This species disappeared about the same time as other megafaunal species during the Quaternary extinction event, which wiped out many of the species that the American lion would have preyed on. Lion bones have been found in the trash heaps of Paleolithic American Indians, suggesting human predation may have contributed to its extinction.
A replica of the jaw of the first specimen of American lion discovered can be seen in the hand of a statue of paleontologist Joseph Leidy, which is currently standing outside the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia.
Read more about this topic: American Lion
Famous quotes containing the word environment:
“We learn through experience and experiencing, and no one teaches anyone anything. This is as true for the infant moving from kicking to crawling to walking as it is for the scientist with his equations. If the environment permits it, anyone can learn whatever he chooses to learn; and if the individual permits it, the environment will teach him everything it has to teach.”
—Viola Spolin (b. 1911)
“... several generations of slum environment will produce a slum heredity ...”
—Albion Fellows Bacon (1865–1933)
“People between twenty and forty are not sympathetic. The child has the capacity to do but it can’t know. It only knows when it is no longer able to do—after forty. Between twenty and forty the will of the child to do gets stronger, more dangerous, but it has not begun to learn to know yet. Since his capacity to do is forced into channels of evil through environment and pressures, man is strong before he is moral. The world’s anguish is caused by people between twenty and forty.”
—William Faulkner (1897–1962)