Geocapromys columbianus
The Cuban coney is an extinct species of rodent in the subfamily Capromyinae. It was endemic to Cuba. Its natural habitats were lowlands moist forests, xeric shrublands and rocky areas. Some scientists indicate that this species may have survived and coexisted with introduced rat species from the Old World until approximately 1500, while others indicate that it became extinct earlier in the Holocene.

via iDigBio · via iDigBio. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.
On record
Recorded, not inferred- Sits inside
- GeocapromysPBDB
- Diet
- herbivore, carnivorePBDB, for Capromyinae
- Life habit
- scansorialPBDB, for Capromyinae
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
- Environment
- terrestrialPBDB, for Eutheria
Time the record covers
At most 2.6 million years on record.
Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 2.58 Mya and 0 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.
4 occurrences of Geocapromys columbianus on record, most of them in the Pleistocene. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.
When
4 occurrences- Pleistocene93%
- Holocene7%
These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.
Geocapromys columbianus and its relatives
PleistoceneWhere Geocapromys columbianus and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.
Found in the same rock
27 taxa- Acratocnus antillensis2 sites
- Aquila2 sites
- Boromys torrei2 sites
- Capromys2 sites
- Neocnus gliriformis2 sites
- Nesophontes2 sites
- Ornimegalonyx oteroi2 sites
- Tyto noeli2 sites
- Acratocnus1 site
- Boromys offella1 site
- Canis1 site
- Capromys acevedo1 site
- Capromys latus1 site
- Capromys pilorides1 site
- Cathartidae1 site
- Chelonoidis cubensis1 site
- Crocodylus1 site
- Crocodylus rhombifer1 site
- Cubacyon transversidens1 site
- Margarobyas1 site
- Megalocnus rodens1 site
- Mesocapromys kraglievichi1 site
- Mesocnus torrei1 site
- Parocnus browni1 site
The Paleobiology Database records 2 sites for Geocapromys columbianus, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.
This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.
Entered from
2 references- Nueva especie de ave fósil (Strigiformes: Tytonidae) del Pleistoceno superior de Cuba3
- The fossil avifauna of the tar seeps Las Breas de San Felipe, Matanzas, Cuba1
Each of the 4 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.
Media and terms
Media content1

Picture of Geocapromys columbianus
- Source
- iDigBio
- Credit
- via iDigBio
- Licence
- not stated by the source
- Commercial use
- cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
No 3D scan of Geocapromys columbianus was found in Sketchfab.
Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.
The description on this site
- Source
- Wikipedia, “Cuban coney”
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 4.0
This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.
Keep going
What may have been alongside itGeocapromys through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Chapman 1982