By 10,000 years ago, the large mammals and the Dire Wolf were extinct. Slower than the other wolf species on the continent at the time, primarily the gray wolf and red wolf, it could not hunt the swifter species that remained and was forced to subsist by scavenging. Starting about 16,000 years ago, coinciding with the end of the last glacial period and the arrival of humans in North America, most of the large mammals upon which the dire wolf depended for prey began to die out (possibly as a result of climate and/or human-induced changes as suggested in a 2008 National Geographic Channel documentary ). During the Late Pleistocene (300,000 years ago) the gray wolf ( Canis lupus) crossed into North America on the Bering Strait land bridge and competed with the dire wolf. Approximately 10,000 years ago the dire wolf became extinct along with most other North American megafauna. The dire wolf was one of the abundant Pleistocene megafauna-a wide variety of very large mammals that lived during the Pleistocene. The Dire Wolf co-existed with the Gray Wolf in North America for about 100,000 years. Unlike the gray wolf, which is of Eurasian origin, the dire wolf evolved on the North American continent, along with the coyote. Relationship to gray wolfĪrtistic rendition of two possible appearances of the dire wolf, one based on a North American origin and the other on a possible South American originĪlthough it was closely related to the gray wolf and other sister species, Canis dirus is not the direct ancestor of any species known today. armbrusteri and move into Central America and South America, appearing in the Late Pleistocene fossil record in northwestern South America. dirus expanded its range to include that of C. armbrusteri, with the latter's final range shrinking to what is now the southeastern U.S., more specifically Florida. armbrusteri, with the two taxa sharing in the open plains and grasslands of what is now the central United States. Canis armbrusteri appeared, and there is good evidence that dire wolf evolved from C. Over the next nine million years, extensive development and diversification of the North American wolves took place by the Middle Pleistocene. Their invasion of South America as part of the Great American Interchange was enabled by the formation of the Isthmus of Panama 3 Ma ago. By 3–5 Ma BP, canids had spread to Africa ( Early Pliocene) and South America ( Late Pliocene). Canids soon spread to Asia and Europe (8 Ma BP) and became the ancestors of modern wolves, jackals, foxes, and the Raccoon Dog. The fossil record suggests that the genus Canis diverged from the small, foxlike Leptocyon in North America sometime in the Late Miocene epoch 9 to 10 million years ( Ma) ago, along with two other genera, Urocyon, and Vulpes. Timeline of canids including Canis dirus in red. Canis mississippiensis was named by Allen in 1876 and synonymized subjectively with Canis dirus by Nowak (1979), Kurten and Anderson (1980) and again by Kurten in 1984. Leidy also named the dire wolf as Canis indianensis in 1869 which was synonymized subjectively with C. ![]() dirus by Lundelius in 1972, Martin (1974), Nowak (1979), Kurten and Anderson (1980) and Kurten in 1984. ![]() It was recombined as Aenocyon ayersi by Merriam in 1918 and was synonymized subjectively with C. In 1916, Canis ayersi was named by Sellards. Taxonomic historyĬanis dirus was named by Joseph Leidy in 1858 and recombined as Aenocyon dirus by Merriam (1918), Hibbard (1949) and Hibbard and Taylor in 1960. It also gives some insight into the pressures placed on the species near the end of its existence. ![]() This large number suggests that the Dire Wolf, like modern wolves and dogs, probably hunted in packs. Fossils from more than 3,600 dire wolves have been recovered from the tar pits, more than any other mammal species. The dire wolf is best known for its unusually high representation in La Brea Tar Pits in California. Norwood's letters to Leidy, as well as the type specimen itself, are preserved at the Academy of Natural Sciences although one of the letters indicates that the specimen was to be returned to Linck's family, as Linck himself died in August 1854. In a publication dated 1858, Leidy assigned the name Canis dirus. Leidy determined that the specimen represented an extinct species of wolf and published a note to that effect in November 1854. Norwood, who at that time was the first state geologist of Illinois, sent the specimen to Joseph Leidy at the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia. The specimen, a fossilized jawbone, was obtained by Joseph Granville Norwood from an Evansville collector named Francis A. The type specimen of the dire wolf was found in Evansville, Indiana in the summer of 1854, when the Ohio River was quite low. A display of some of the thousands of Dire Wolf skulls found in La Brea tar pits
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