Miracinonyx

Miracinonyx, colloquially known as the American cheetah, is an extinct genus of feline that was native to North America during the Pliocene and Pleistocene epoch. Its closest living relative is the cougar, while its anatomical similarities to the modern cheetah are possibly a result of convergent evolution, the development of analogous physical traits between distinct, not closely related species with a shared ancestry due to facing similar environmental pressures.

Miracinonyx

Edward Drinker Cope (1899) · Public Domain · via Wikipedia/Commons. 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
Also called
American cheetahPBDB
Sits inside
FelinaePBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Felidae
Life habit
scansorialPBDB, for Felidae
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Eutheria

Time the record covers

At least 1.6 million years on record.

The record covers at least 1.8 Mya to 129 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 4.7 Mya to 11.7 ka.

Pliocene — about 5 of 32 occurrencesPliocenePleistocene — about 28 of 32 occurrencesPleistoceneHolocene — about 0 of 32 occurrences4.9–4.7 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences4.7–4.5 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences4.5–4.3 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences4.3–4.2 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences4.2–4.0 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences4.0–3.8 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences3.8–3.6 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences3.6–3.5 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences3.5–3.3 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences3.3–3.1 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences3.1–2.9 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences2.9–2.8 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences2.8–2.6 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences2.6–2.4 Mya — about 1 occurrence2.4–2.3 Mya — about 1 occurrence2.3–2.1 Mya — about 1 occurrence2.1–1.9 Mya — about 1 occurrence1.9–1.7 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences1.7–1.6 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences1.6–1.4 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences1.4–1.2 Mya — about 2 occurrences1.2–1.0 Mya — about 2 occurrences1.0–867 ka Mya — about 2 occurrences867 ka–693 ka Mya — about 2 occurrences693 ka–520 ka Mya — about 2 occurrences520 ka–347 ka Mya — about 2 occurrences347 ka–173 ka Mya — about 2 occurrences173 ka–0 Mya — about 10 occurrences1.8 Mya129 ka5.2 Mya0 Mya

32 occurrences of Miracinonyx 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

32 occurrences

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.

Found in

7 formations

Santa Clara — 37.26°N, 122.05°WRancho Viejo Beds — 21.03°N, 100.75°WSeymour — 33.75°N, 99.50°WBlanco — 33.77°N, 101.28°WWaccamaw — 33.61°N, 78.97°WShuler — 32.71°N, 96.71°WTurlock Lake — 37.06°N, 120.20°W

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The named rock units Miracinonyx has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 25 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Miracinonyx and its relatives

Pleistocene

Where Miracinonyx and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.

Found in the same rock

588 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 31 sites for Miracinonyx, 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

22 references

Each of the 32 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. 9 further references are not listed. 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 content4

Picture of Miracinonyx

Credit
Edward Drinker Cope (1899)
Licence
Public Domain
Commercial use
the licence allows it

3D scan

Licence
CC0 — this site’s default, not the record’s
Commercial use
the licence allows it
Specimen
Miracinonyx inexpectatus (Cope)

Laser scan

Licence
In Copyright
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
Specimen
Miracinonyx trumani · ku:kuvp:435639

3D model

Source
Sketchfab
Licence
CC Attribution-NonCommercial
Commercial use
the licence does not allow it

The description on this site

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 itFelinae through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Adams 1979)